


The Hundred-Year Festival

by twisted_dendrites



Category: Naruto
Genre: Festivals, Fireworks, First Kiss, Flashbacks, Fluff, Fortune Telling, Glittering Caves, Kage Bunshin | Shadow Clones, Love Confessions, M/M, Making Out, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sexual Tension, Sharing a Bed, Stargazing, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, gaanaru - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2020-11-07 15:58:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 34,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20819975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twisted_dendrites/pseuds/twisted_dendrites
Summary: Life for all shinobi is put on hold for a special festival that only occurs once every one hundred years. Just how many romantic clichés can Naruto and Gaara encounter in seven days?(Takes place in Shippuden sometime between the Gaara retrieval arc and the Fourth Shinobi World War (aka fight w/Madara))





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So the reason this fic takes place at this point in the timeline is because I actually haven't finished Shippuden yet! I'm currently at around episode 430, so I'm getting there. Anyway Gaara and Naruto are perfect for each other, and apparently I have a lot of feelings about it.

Naruto definitely had something of the utmost importance to tell Granny Tsunade, which, after bursting through the Godaime’s door in the middle of the day, unannounced, he completely forgot.

“Whoa, what’s all this stuff?”

Dozens, if not hundreds of boxes were stacked in haphazard piles surrounding the Hokage’s desk. Some of the boxes, mostly the ones at the tops of the piles, were open and overflowing with what appeared to be banners, silks, decorations, and clothes from another era. Flashes of shimmering gold, sleek jade, and brilliant vermilion winked at him as Sakura and Shizune picked through the contents of their respective boxes.

Tsunade, as usual, sat at her desk. She pinched the skin between her eyebrows at either his question or his sudden entrance and sighed. Sakura and Shizune both stopped what they were doing to look up at him.

“It’s for the Hundred-Year Festival,” Sakura explained, “It’s coming up soon, so we need to start preparing now.”

“The what?” Naruto asked.

Shizune shared a look with Sakura before returning to sort through the boxes. Sakura sighed.

“It’s a festival that happens every one hundred years. It takes place in the Village Hidden in the Valleys, with the shrine farther south in the Land of Rivers. Seriously, you don’t remember any of this at all?”

Naruto narrowed his eyes, as if focusing his sight might help him remember. It didn’t.

Tsunade stood up from her desk.

“It’s a seven day festival to honor the oldest gods of creation. People from all nations go, and there is an understood treaty of peace during that time. There are traditional ceremonies and events on each of the seven days, and ninja and civilians alike will be there. In fact, the daimyo of each nation will be there to close the festival at the end of the week. Attendance, for those who are able, is mandatory.”

She walked around to where Shizune stood, apparently interested in whatever had just been unboxed.

Naruto tilted his head, trying to reconcile this new information with the fact that the entire village didn’t really have the resources for everyone to go on a week long break.

“But—but what about missions? And—and—how can everyone be expected to go?”

Tsunade ignored him.

“Naruto, this is a once in a lifetime event. Everything just gets put on pause for something like this. Most people are thrilled to attend! And think how lucky we are that we’re not too young or too old, and we’ll actually remember it!”

Naruto stuck his finger in his ear and twisted it around, clearly unimpressed. He had more important things to do than go to some week long festival.

“Ehhh...”

He leaned against a stack of boxes which toppled over and spewed clouds of dust upon impact. Tsunade’s head shot up and she sent him a death glare.

“Try to be a little more grateful, brat. You’re going whether you like it or not!”

Naruto held out his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay.”

“The ANBU will stay to guard anyone who actually isn’t able to go,” Sakura added, in case Naruto had been wondering. He hadn’t, but he nodded anyway, as if he had expected so.

He bent down to rearrange the boxes that he had knocked over. More funny looking costumes had been strewn from inside the toppled boxes across the floor.

Naruto picked up one of the gaudiest gowns and held it up. “Hey, hey, Tsunade-baachan. Is this what people used to wear back in the day?”

Shizune covered her mouth to hide laughter as a vein in Tsunade’s forehead throbbed.

“Idiot, I’m not that old! What did you want anyway?”

Naruto dropped the offending garment back into its box and scratched the back of his head. He smiled. “You know, I kinda don’t remember...”

~~

It was the first night of the festival, and already Gaara had a headache. It had been a tedious morning and afternoon of coordinating, making sure that everyone from his village was following protocol, that everything had been set up correctly, and that the rest of the festival was prepared to go smoothly. Then there was the opening ceremony at which the five Kage each had to give a speech.

By the time the sun had finally set, Gaara was ready to turn in for the night, but Temari was determined to torture him some more. She claimed that he should enjoy the festival and that a break from all of the work to get to this point would be good for him. He wanted her words to be true, so he had followed along.

In a way, he felt she was right. Though Gaara hated large crowds of people, he almost felt like he blended in as just another ninja. There were so many people from countries that he had never dealt with, so many people that barely recognized him as one of the speakers from the earlier ceremony, let alone as the Kazekage. The anonymity was nice, to some extent. It was rare that he didn’t meet someone who looked at him with fear in their eyes. Even working as hard as he had for the past three years to earn the trust of the citizens of Sunagakure, the fact that he was a Kage at all was intimidating, let alone one with his violent past.

But that didn’t mean he suddenly liked the suffocating feeling of people jammed all around him. As he and Temari walked from booth to booth, the smells of cooking meat blended together with sweat from the overpopulated crowd. People bumped into him from every angle, and children ran up and down the aisles screaming. All of the commotion made it hard to relax.

Gaara was beginning to wish that he had taken up Kankuro’s offer to help behind the scenes of his puppet show.

At some point, they made their way to a goldfish scooping booth. It was crowded, like every other stall, but both Gaara and Temari recognized the participants here.

Akimichi Chouji, Nara Shikamaru, Yamanaka Ino, Haruno Sakura, and Uzumaki Naruto were crowded around the small pool of fish.

Gaara suddenly felt frozen in place. He hadn’t seen Naruto much since the whole experience with Shukaku being removed and Granny Chiyo sacrificing herself for him. He certainly hadn’t seen Naruto in a casual setting like this. Looking at him, laughing with his friends, wearing yukata instead of regular ninja gear, seemed like more of an unreal dream than something that Gaara could actually witness.

Luckily (or perhaps unluckily – for him), Temari did not react with the same hesitation. “Hey! If it isn’t our old friends from the chuunin exams!”

She was able to insert herself and Gaara seamlessly into the group of five that had already been playing. Gaara made his mouth uptick in a sort of smile. Social interactions were still pretty unnatural for him, but he was striving to appear at least somewhat amicable.

Once all of the greetings were out of the way, everyone’s focus resumed on the game. Ino and Sakura seemed to be having a blast and catching dozens of fish between them. Chouji was tapping his foot impatiently and mumbling about food. Temari somehow ended up next to Shikamaru, who was painfully inept at scooping fish. Which left Naruto all to Gaara.

Gaara swallowed thickly as the shopkeeper handed him a paper net. He stepped into the free space next to Naruto, and watched the blond dip his own paper net into the tank.

Orange and black fish scattered as the thin paper circle approached them, but Naruto managed to slip his net under a tiny gold one. His motions were quick and fluid, and soon he had a goldfish in a tiny metal bowl next to him.

“I make it look easy, but it’s actually pretty tricky,” Naruto boasted, turning to grin widely at Gaara.

Gaara exhaled sharply, stifling the urge to laugh. Without replying, he dipped his own net into the water and waited. Beside him, Ino and Sakura were scaring all the fish his way. Just as a black one hovered above his net, he hastily raised it out of the water. As he looked down to inspect his catch, he saw that the paper had torn, and the fish had escaped.

“See what I mean?” Naruto teased.

“I see,” Gaara agreed.

On his second try, he also failed. The third time was the charm, and he managed to capture a tiny orange guppy to match Naruto’s.

“Alright, alright, we all caught fish. Time to eat now?” Chouji asked excitedly.

“Well, not all of us,” Temari laughed from the other end of the tank, where Shikamaru was racking up torn nets.

Chouji crossed his arms, and the girls laughed.

“You go on ahead without me, I’ll catch up,” Shikamaru proposed. “I can’t lose my dignity like this.”

Sakura, Ino, and Naruto circled around Chouji, meanwhile, Gaara noticed that Temari stayed next to Shikamaru. She looked up and caught her brother’s stare. “Go on ahead. I’ll be here,” she reassured him.

“Yeah, come on! We’ve already got fish,” Naruto called. His body moved like he was about to step towards Gaara, but then decided against it. He flinched and ended up slinging his arm around Chouji.

Gaara nodded and joined the Leaf shinobi.

The group continued making their way down the stalls, stopping to get food here and there. Gaara thought that this was what Chouji had in mind until they stopped in front of a yakitori tent, with rows of wooden tables set up behind it.

“Finally!” exclaimed Chouji, rushing to one of the tables. The two girls shook their heads and laughed, while Naruto stood still reading the posted menu. A group of children ran by, shrieking with delight—of course shrieking—and two ran right into Gaara. One was able to stumble their way around him, while the other landed flat on her behind.

The girl, probably no older than nine, looked up at Gaara with rounded eyes. Fear stricken eyes. He recognized this girl from Suna. Her eyes welled up with tears as she tried to inch her way backwards away from him.

“I’m so sorry, K-Kazakage-s-s-sama...”

Gaara stood there dumbly, not knowing what to do. Naruto came to his rescue. He crouched down in front of the girl and smiled disarmingly.

“It’s okay. Did you get hurt? My friend Sakura-chan over there with the pink hair is a great medi-nin, and I’m sure she can help you.”

The girl shook her head. Naruto reached out, and she grabbed his hands and allowed him to help her up.

“Well, be careful, okay?”

The girl nodded, and then, with one last glance at Gaara, she bowed her head and dashed away to join her friends.

Gaara let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding.

Naruto turned to him and laughed. “Honestly, I’m surprised _I _haven’t bowled anyone over yet.”

Gaara just nodded. The fear in that girl’s eyes was still with him. He suddenly didn’t feel like he had the energy to deal with the crowds and the noise and bright lights anymore.

“Are you guys coming or what?” Ino called from the table where she and Sakura had joined Chouji.

Naruto looked at Gaara expectantly. The weight of those bright blue eyes made him catch his breath again. He couldn’t do this.

“I’m not hungry,” he stated.

Something dark passed through that radiant gaze, and Naruto’s smile faltered.

“Are you okay?”

Gaara didn’t want to cause a scene, but he knew he couldn’t stay here much longer. There were too many things out of his control, literally ready to crash into him at any moment. He’d kept his cool for long enough, but he craved some time to crawl into his own head and feel completely safe.

“I think I’m going to go visit the shrine,” he said simply.

A moment passed between them.

“Can I go with you?” Naruto asked.

Gaara felt his heart jump inside his chest, and he almost said no. It felt wrong to accept an offer that he so badly wanted.

“Sure,” he replied, and he hated how indifferent his tone sounded as it came out.

Naruto didn’t seem to mind. He called some excuse to his friends, and then he and Gaara were off and running and away from the mobs of people.

The shrine wasn’t exactly close to the village, but Gaara almost felt thankful for the distance. He savored the burn of his lungs as he ran and jumped through the trees, he embraced the familiar bunching and stretching of his muscles as he maneuvered through the terrain. Even the pitch black of night felt like a comforting cloak separating him from the anxieties of the festival.

For the first half of the journey, Naruto kept quiet. Then, his garrulous nature overtook him, and he started talking about anything and everything down to the most insignificant detail. Gaara appreciated the chatter, as it kept him from thinking about that small girl that held so much terror in her eyes.

Eventually, they came to a rest. Gaara watched as Naruto noisily gulped water from his canteen. He felt his insides lurch as he tried to think of something to say. He thought of how easily Temari had sidled up next to Shikamaru at the goldfish scooping table, how she had bantered with him, and how she had stayed behind with him without any qualms.

Gaara wished he could act so naturally.

“Did you hear that?” Naruto asked suddenly.

Gaara wrenched himself from his thoughts and strained to listen. He could hear some faint rustling in the greenery below them, which wouldn’t be uncommon for a small animal, except for the fact that he could also hear hushed voices.

Gaara felt the sand inside his gourd shift in preparation, and Naruto drew a kunai. Just as Gaara was about to use the Sand Eye to scout ahead, Naruto jumped down through the foliage out of Gaara’s sight. There was a scream, and Gaara felt his heart harden like a rock as he jumped after Naruto. Landing, he saw a figure disappearing into some bushes, while Naruto was standing quite plainly, looking sheepish.

“What happened? What was it?” Gaara asked. Now that his senses were on high alert, he could hear two distinct footfalls of the people running away. Their chakra signatures were weak, and they didn’t seem to be malevolent.

Naruto ran a hand through his hair and looked down at his feet. “Well, uh, it was just, uh...it was just a couple...”

Gaara did not understand, and when it was apparent that he didn’t, Naruto elaborated with some crude hand motions.

“Oh,” Gaara said, when it finally registered, “So it was a couple having sex.”

Naruto stared at the forest floor. “Uh..yeah...well...I guess they figured they were far enough away from everything, that’d it be private...”

“They should have just used the room in their assigned inn. It probably would have been closer,” Gaara reasoned.

The thought of other couples having sex didn’t embarrass him the way that it clearly embarrassed Naruto. His education to sex had all been from a very clinical standpoint, and most all of his tutors had made it very clear that no one would ever think of an abomination like him in that way. It was just something that other people experienced that didn’t apply to Gaara, like so many other things.

Obviously Naruto’s education had been different.

“Anyway, l-let’s keep going,” Naruto stammered.

Gaara followed his lead, but this time, he had a hard time pushing down the questions that kept popping up as he thought about the differences and similarities between the ways that the two jinchuuriki had grown up.

It wasn’t that he hadn’t thought about it before, hell, hadn’t that been the majority of the conversation he had with Naruto during their fight at the chuunin exams?

It was different than that. It was how that small child had looked at him, terrified, even though he wasn’t even harboring Shukaku anymore. It was how people feared _him_, not the monster he had housed inside of him, and to this day he couldn’t live it down. It was how Naruto, under the same circumstances, had never been viewed as a threat.

Somehow, Gaara had become the monster they had seen him as, and even now it was difficult to maintain an image of humanity.

Difficult, but not impossible. He could admit to himself that many citizens of Suna had warmed up to him over the years. For someone who hadn’t witnessed him changing over the years, how would Naruto—someone who had seen through him since the beginning—feel about him now?

“I think we’re here!” Naruto shouted, barely interrupting Gaara’s train of thought.

He watched as the Leaf shinobi approached the purification fountain at the shrine’s entrance and began washing his hands and mouth. Gaara followed suit, and soon the two were approaching the offering hall. Despite it being the first night of the festival, the temple grounds were dead silent and devoid of any other people.

“I guess we got here pretty late. It was farther than I expected, and we did kind of, uh, get stopped on the way,” Naruto chattered, ignoring the fact that he could have whispered and Gaara still would have heard him.

Naruto approached the offering, tossed a few coins in, bowed twice, clapped twice, and the bowed once more.

Gaara’s thoughts swam, and it must have shown on his face, because when Naruto turned around to face him, he faltered.

“Gaara?”

“Thank you,” Gaara managed to say.

Naruto blinked, then tilted his head. “Eh?” It was unlike him to be at a loss for words.

“For coming with me,” Gaara continued.

Naruto’s confusion seemed to clear up instantly, and he flashed a wide smile at Gaara. “No problem! That’s what friends are for, right? I wasn’t gonna let you go alone, and you seemed kind of, uh...”

“What?”

Naruto shuffled to the side, like he was expecting to step up to the offering next. Like that would end their conversation. When Gaara didn’t move, he sighed.

“Just, when that girl ran into you and got so scared. I mean, it seemed like that upset you. And I totally get it, because like, I’ve been there, you know. So yeah...”

Seeing Naruto after all of this time had brought up a lot of old feelings. Regret, mostly. Frustration that habits were hard to change and perceptions of himself even harder. Feelings of gratefulness that Naruto had knocked some sense in him about what it meant to be alive and the importance of forming connections with others.

But it had brought up new feelings as well. Feelings that stirred when he thought about the way Temari looked at Shikamaru, or when he listened to that unfortunate couple fleeing through the woods after their privacy was invaded. Feelings that swelled when Naruto stepped in front of him to soothe that crying girl, to defend him from her fears, to make him seem like more of a regular person just hanging out with friends at a festival. Feelings that strained when he thought about Naruto acting so damn embarrassed when he tried to explain what he had seen that couple doing.

“Anyway, I try to remind myself that not everyone’s gonna like me. It happens to everyone, you know, even for arbitrary reasons. Sometimes it has nothing to do with me being a jinchuuriki. Some people just think I talk too much or I’m too loud and annoying. Some people, I don’t even know, I feel like they just have no reason for the people they like or dislike. I mean it’s alright as long as I’m doing my best and they’re doing their best. We don’t have to get along or whatever. You know? And anyway, people can change their minds too...”

And now, as Naruto went on and on trying to make Gaara feel better for something that, objectively seemed so insignificant, but had struck a nerve in each former outcast, Gaara smiled. Really smiled.

“Also, earlier when you were giving your speech at the opening ceremony, I heard from Kankuro and Temari that most people of Suna really respect you and look up to you and think you’re doing a great job as Kazekage, which is obvious to me, so I’m glad people are finally waking up from being idiots...”

Gaara stepped up to the offering and fished some coins out of his pocket. He tossed them in and bowed twice.

“...some kids cry at everything, and maybe she was just embarrassed that she ran into the leader of her village, and she didn’t want _you_ to think poorly of _her_...”

Gaara clapped twice, bowed once more, and prayed briefly. Naruto stopped talking.

When he was done praying, he turned to face Naruto again. The Leaf ninja was looking down, but must have felt eyes on him. He looked up at Gaara through his lashes.

Seeing Naruto looking at him like that made Gaara feel like someone was strangling him.

“I didn’t want to interrupt you when you were praying,” Naruto said.

Gaara shook his head. “You didn’t. Anyway, why don’t we sit down?”

There was a bench next to the main shrine where they both took a seat.

“So, I guess you saw me in that ridiculous outfit I had to wear while giving that speech,” Gaara said.

Naruto laughed. “It wasn’t so bad. Did you see what Tsunade-baachan had to wear? You got off lucky! You still looked good, uh, y’know, respectable.”

Gaara couldn’t help but memorize everything about the way Naruto had said that compliment. His tone, the creases at the sides of his eyes as he smiled, the way his eyes glinted with what little light was coming from the moon and stars above.

“When you’re Hokage, they’ll make you wear ridiculous clothes too,” Gaara responded.

Naruto’s entire face lit up at the mention of him becoming Hokage. The feeling of being strangled returned again, and Gaara looked away to his hands. A thousand more sentences bubbled up in his throat, all designed to keep Naruto smiling at him like that, all gagging him. He brought his hand to his cheek, as if brushing some bug away. His face was hot to the touch.

“I guess it’s not so bad then,” Naruto said, in an unusually measured tone, “Tsunade-baachan and Sakura-chan were both telling me that this festival only happens every hundred years so we ought to make the most of it and take advantage of the fact that we’ll be able to remember this time for the rest of our lives. It made me kind of wonder though, why doesn’t everyone live every day like that?”

Gaara continued staring at his hands, folded in his lap. He shifted his thumbs around. “Some people need an excuse,” he offered.

Naruto didn’t respond, and when Gaara finally looked back up at his friend, his breath caught in his chest. Naruto was staring at him, smiling softly, his eyes half closed. He looked content, and not in the over exaggerated way that he usually did.

As Gaara stuttered to force air into his lungs, he watched as Naruto reached a hand to touch his shoulder. Gaara gave up on trying to breathe.

“I’m really glad to see you tonight,” Naruto stated, his eyes locked with Gaara’s.

Gaara’s vision pulsed, and his mind seemed to unwind in his skull. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. The only thing he felt was the weight of Naruto’s hand on his shoulder and the exploding heat in his chest at an intensity that he hadn’t felt since Shukaku had gone. Gaara was powerless to respond, and when he didn’t, and when the moment ended, and Naruto had pulled away and looked down, Gaara felt like he’d been punched in the face without his sand armor.

Desperate to bring the moment back, Gaara rushed to say the first thing to come to mind, “I was really looking forward to seeing you too.”

But that didn’t do it. Naruto looked up at him, his generic friendly expression inscrutable.

“It’s late. We should probably head back now,” Naruto said gently.

Panicking at his utter absence of control of the situation, Gaara continued. “The inn I’m staying at is closer to here than the one assigned to the Leaf shinobi. You can stay with me.”

He didn’t want this to end. He didn’t to close the door on whatever had just happened between them, and he had no idea what to do about it. Naruto’s face gave nothing away, and Gaara, who had never had an interaction like this in his life, was afraid he’d destroyed something precious without even realizing it.

“Okay.”

Gaara calmed a little at that. Without exchanging any more words, the two shinobi were off. Gaara followed Naruto’s lead until they got back into the village.

The innkeeper did not so much as raise an eyebrow as she handed Gaara the key to his room. Judgment from the staff was really the least of Gaara’s concerns though.

Naruto hadn’t said anything the entire way back, which was unlike him. Of course Gaara didn’t know what to say, but he felt like he should say something. It puzzled him why Naruto even agreed to stay with him at all, especially if there was something wrong that was causing his silence.

As they made their way up the stairs, Gaara heard Naruto yawn. Maybe he was just tired. Being tired was another state of mind that Gaara did not experience like everyone else. He had never wanted to sleep when he had Shukaku, and the habit stuck around even after he was gone. His body had adapted to a lack of sleep, and he didn’t notice drowsiness anymore.

They got to the room, which was simple, and clearly set up for one person. Who would expect the Kazekage to be bringing someone back to his room?

Gaara shuffled through his things that had been delivered to his room earlier and pulled out some paperwork. He could probably get through at least a quarter of it overnight, and it was always good to keep up with the mountains of paperwork that came with bureaucracy.

Naruto milled about getting ready for bed, using the washroom, stripping down to his boxers, and setting up the single bedroll that accompanied the room. Gaara found it amusing how Naruto seemed to operate on autopilot. Eventually Naruto settled down to sleep, and Gaara stretched out his fingers, shifting his sand to dim the lights. His sand had barely moved when Naruto sat bolt upright, startling Gaara. The sand hissed and spiked, shutting off the lights completely.

“Aren’t you gonna sleep too?” Naruto asked, his question strangely accusatory. “There’s room...”

Gaara decided against turning the lights back on. His eyes would adjust to the moonlight, though it wasn’t that great to read by. He ended up setting his papers down.

“I don’t sleep much. When I had Shukaku...”

He didn’t finish the sentence, but he didn’t need to.

“You have to be tired though, it was a busy day for you. Not that every day isn’t busy for you, being Kazekage and all. Come to think of it, you probably always need rest...” Naruto’s voice was fading in volume. A soft shushing sound intimated that he had lain back down.

Gaara let himself be persuaded, not so much by Naruto’s reasoning, but by the mere concept of being closer to him. As he made his way to the bedding, he found himself musing that, without Naruto, the bedroll would have gone ignored completely.

Despite Naruto’s claim that Gaara needed rest, Gaara still didn’t get much sleep. He was been paralyzed by Naruto’s body heat that radiated toward him under the blanket they shared. He didn’t want to move away, and he couldn’t justify bringing himself any closer. Just as well, because he was hyper-aware of any motion that he made, worried that it might wake Naruto. He had never before noticed just how loud his breathing was, or just how violently his heart raced. A little past 2 AM, and he had begun to wonder if maybe he should see a cardiologist upon his return to Suna.

A little past 4 AM and he had to get up.

Still wary of disturbing the sleeping ninja, he slipped out of the room and made his way to the roof of the inn. It was still bare night out and too dark to do any reading, but Gaara was used to the pause of the world that occurred while everyone was sleeping. It was times like these that he missed Shukaku—and then immediately felt guilty about ever thinking such a thing.

He jumped down from the roof, agitated. This wasn’t his village to patrol, but he figured there wouldn’t be any harm in one extra sweep.


	2. Chapter 2

Naruto woke, and before he even opened his eyes, he decided that there was no way that last night hadn’t been a dream. Then, he did open his eyes and realized that this was not the room he had been assigned to share with Sai. Furthermore, he noticed that he was alone in the room, which, other than the bag and stacks of paper bearing the Sand Village seal, was rather unidentifiable.

_No fucking way_, Naruto thought, jumping up and scrambling around the room to get dressed. Grabbing his things, he rushed out the door in a whirlwind.

_Where the hell is Gaara?_

He decided he would get a better vantage point from the roof, and he bounded up the steps, two at a time, until he flung open the door to the roof. The door caught in a wall of sand, and he realized that he’d nearly bashed the Kazekage in the face.

“You’re awake,” Gaara said simply. The sand dissolved, and he put his hand on the door and opened it fully for himself. Naruto stood there, dumbfounded and blocking Gaara’s way.

“Where’d you go?” Naruto asked, feeling frantic. It was one thing to wake up in the Kazekage’s room, another for the Kazekage to not actually be there, and yet another to not even know what time it was. He looked past Gaara to judge the position of the sun in the sky and--

“Oh shit! I’m late!”

All of the Leaf shinobi were supposed to be present for some kind of procession to the shrine where the Hokage would give some special offering and--

“Sorry, Garra, I gotta go. I’ll see you later, okay?”

Naruto shimmied his way around the Kazekage onto the roof and took off.

~~

On his way, Naruto counted his lucky stars that he had been to the shrine last night and already knew the way. He wasn’t too late, he made it in time to be the last in the procession (there was a joke in there somewhere about always being dead last, which he was _not_ going to bring up), and Sakura only kind of glared daggers at him (she was too far away to punch him for his tardiness).

Tsunade-baachan was already standing in front of the osenko with the shrine priest, giving some speech and probably blessing everyone. Fortunately for Naruto, the ceremony didn’t require much of him, just some bowing here and there, which gave him ample opportunity to sort out (or, more accurately, attempt to sort out) what had happened since his arrival in the Village Hidden in the Valleys.

Last night, at this very shrine, things had taken a weird turn. Naruto hadn’t expected to lay it on so thick with the, “this is a once in a lifetime event that we should make the most of,” and, “I’m really glad to see you tonight,” and stuff, but the feelings had kind of jumped out of his throat before he knew what he was saying. He definitely hadn’t set out to accompany Gaara to the shrine for the purpose of absolutely making an idiot of himself (although that was always a risk), he truly had gone because he didn’t want Gaara to be all alone and depressed.

But then? Gaara hadn’t even noticed? Or had he? Because somehow he ended up inviting Naruto back to his room and then? It seemed like he would have been content reading reports for the rest of the night!

And then – _and then_! He’d just up and left sometime! Not even bothering to wake him up!

The more Naruto thought about it, the less sense he was able to make of it.

When the ceremony was finally over, Sai caught up with him first.

“Why are you still wearing a yukata? Didn’t you change since yesterday?”

Before Naruto could respond, Sakura was also there.

“Naruto! Where the hell were you?!”

Naruto tried to open his mouth, but was foiled by the appearance of Tsunade-baachan.

“Brat! Don’t think I didn’t see you sneaking in late! You better not be late to the closing ceremony at the end of the week. I will personally drag your ass out of bed over here if I have to. The daimyo is going to be there, and I will not let you ruin the reputation of the Leaf Village!”

The Hokage stormed off without waiting for a response from him, and Ino took her place.

Naruto waited to see if anyone else wanted to come over and ream him out, but that seemed to be the end of it.

“Sai said you didn’t come back to your room last night,” Sakura said in a strangely sing-song voice. She smirked and glanced at Sai, whose expression was faintly amused. Beside her, Ino giggled, which in turn set off even more giggling from Sakura.

Naruto was not sure he liked where this was going. He considered lying.

“Uh—er—well, you see...”

Ino interrupted his stuttering. “Did you spend the whole night with Gaara-san?”

Naruto felt his face getting hot, and he hoped that he wasn’t turning red, though he suspected that he probably was. Nothing had happened, so there wasn’t really anything to even be embarrassed about (besides maybe his complete lack of game—but they didn’t know about that so…!).

“Uh...yeah. Well, I guess the shrine was farther than I expected, and it was already kind of late, and then by the time we were coming back, Gaara mentioned that the inn he’s staying at is closer to the shrine...”

“Gaara-san asked you to spend the night in his room?” Ino gasped, her eyes widening. She shared another look with Sakura, who seemed just as mock scandalized.

“Is that where you were?” Sakura asked.

Naruto looked down at his clothes which were the same that he had been wearing the night before.

“Isn’t it obvious?” he mumbled. His tone sounded glum. Ino didn’t seem to notice, but Sakura lost her smile and furrowed her brows.

This wasn’t the optimal place to talk about it. There was still a bunch of people left over from the ceremony hanging around, and Naruto didn’t particularly feel like having his private life broadcast to everyone (especially not more than it already always was).

At least Sakura seemed to sense this.

“Later then,” she decided, “I’ll meet you in your room after lunch. Your room with Sai, that is.”

~~

It’s not that Naruto was looking for Gaara when he returned to the village to eat lunch. It was just that he noticed that he didn’t see him, and that kind of put a damper on his appetite. That and the fact that the ramen in the Hidden Valley Village was no where near as good as Ichiraku’s.

He eventually made it back to the inn. The accommodations for the Leaf Shinobi were understandably much less luxurious than what had been afforded to the Kazekage, but it didn’t make much of a difference to Naruto. After all, his room in the inn was much cleaner than his apartment at home…

Unlike the Kazekage’s room, which had its own private washroom, each floor of this inn had two communal washrooms. Another difference was that the rooms in this inn were smaller, with less furnishings. The room that Naruto and Sai were sharing had a rickety metal framed bunk bed with yellowed linens drooping across each mattress. There were no decorations or scrolls on the walls, but the wallpaper wasn’t ripped and the floor was tidy enough. Sai had shoved both of their bags under the bottom bunk, which he seemed to have claimed.

Naruto was glad to get clean and collapse on the floor in his bathrobe. Next to him was the yukata he had been wearing earlier. He would have to wear it again tonight, since they were all going to some dance performance.

“Is there a laundry machine here?” Naruto asked, not thrilled about getting back into the same yukata again. At some point it was going to stink, which surely wouldn’t help his chances with Gaara.

Sai did not look up from the book he was reading in his bed. “It’s on the first floor.”

Naruto absorbed this information but didn’t move. He tried to calculate if he would have enough time to wash and dry the yukata before he had to be at the theater. He had a suspicion that he shouldn’t test his luck with being late a second time today.

“You didn’t happen to bring any extra yukata, did you?” Naruto asked.

Sighing, Sai shut his book, and turned his head to look at Naruto. He had that really creepy insincere smile on his face that almost made Naruto sorry for asking.

“Actually, I did. You can borrow one if you like.”

Naruto gratefully accepted, then both shinobi changed into their clothes for the evening. Sakura stopped by a little later. It was still early to leave for the show, so Naruto knew that she wanted to continue the conversation from earlier.

She sat next to Sai on his bed, while Naruto remained sitting on the floor.

“What. Happened.”

Naruto began telling her everything, to the best of his ability. Sakura-chan was smart, so she could probably understand Gaara’s point of view and give him some good advice on how not to screw up the remaining six nights left of the festival.

Although, he must not have explained it that well, because at one point, Sakura had lept up and grabbed Naruto by the front of his (actually Sai’s) yukata, and pulled him to his feet. She looked like she was about to hit him, and he winced in anticipation.

“No, ow! Sakura-chan, wait--”

“Naruto! You can’t pressure someone to sleep with you!”

“That’s not what I—I meant—stop hitting—Sakura-chan--!”

Behind the flurry of blows, Sai stood up.

“Sakura, stop. If not for Naruto’s sake, then at least for the sake of my yukata.”

Sakura abruptly let go, and Naruto stumbled backwards, falling against the wall. He braced himself there for a few seconds, catching his breath. At least this hadn’t happened earlier, in public. Small victories.

“I just meant there was space next to me to sleep. Sleep! I wasn’t even that pushy about it--”

Sakura scoffed at this.

“It wasn’t that big of a deal. But when I woke up he wasn’t there...”

Sakura shook her head, her face falling into her hand. Sai wasn’t any more helpful. His creepy smile had faded into a pensive expression. Naruto almost wished to hear him make some sort of dick joke, just to lighten the mood.

“So what should I do? I told him I’d see him later today,” Naruto added, partially just to fill the growing awkward silence and partially in hopes of receiving an actual answer.

Surprisingly, it was Sai who responded.

“Naruto, I’ve never known you not to wear your heart on your sleeve. If you can sit by him during the dance performance, go for it. The right words will come to you.”

Naruto just frowned. “That’s a cop-out answer.”

~~

Naruto was unable to sit by Gaara for the dance performance. The Kazekage was sitting in an exclusive box with the other four Kage and some people in their entourage. Although Naruto usually wasn’t shy about barging into places where he wasn’t wanted, he held back this time. Sai had been so sure that he’d just magically know what to say and do, but so far, Naruto was coming up blank.

After the show was a different story. When the curtain closed, Naruto planned to bolt over to the exit and wait for Gaara. His strategy proved to be unnecessary, because Gaara somehow snuck up on him just as the show ended.

Naruto yelped. “When did you get here? I thought you were up in that box with all the other Kage, not that I was staring or anything—”

Sakura elbowed Naruto in the ribs, and he was almost grateful.

“My siblings are going to a tea house with some friends. Do you want to come?”

“Huh? Me? I—I—”

“He’d love to!” Sakura cut in, “Sai and I were just about to apologize because we have to go do something and leave Naruto alone, so this works out great!”

“You do? Ow! Oh, right, you do.”

If Gaara thought any part of this interaction was weird, he didn’t show it.

“Well, we’re leaving now,” Gaara said.

“Oh...okay!” Naruto looked at both Sakura and Sai, hoping they could offer him some last minute help. He didn’t know how they could help, and apparently they didn’t either.

They waved as Naruto followed Gaara back to where his siblings and their friends had gathered. They seemed to have been expecting him.

Naruto was able to loosen up a little by talking to Temari and Kankuro and their friends. By the time they reached the tea house, he almost felt confident. Naruto had been to parties like this before, with Ero-sennin, although back then he had been dragged there, unwilling, and bored out of his mind.

It was a different story to be here on his own accord. He still remembered all the games that the maiko played. And since he and Gaara were still underage and couldn’t drink, they had the advantage.

When the maiko realized this, they began pitting Gaara and Naruto against each other in the games. Gaara, not having the experience that Naruto did, was no match.

After one such victory, Kankuro pulled Naruto over next to him.

“Thanks, man.”

Confused, Naruto looked around the room. Temari just shook her head.

“He’s drunk,” Gaara stated.

Kankuro narrowed his eyes, swiveling his head from Naruto to Gaara and then back to Naruto.

“I may be, but that doesn’t change the fact that me and Temari owe a big fucking thank you to you.”

Naruto tried to inch away, back to the safety of the end of the table where Gaara was sitting, but Kankuro threw an arm around his shoulders.

“Three, four years ago, I never would have imagined something like this. Gaara playing games with us? Gaara losing and not murdering everyone?”

“Kankuro!” Temari interjected sharply.

Kankuro continued anyway, disregarding the warning from his sister. “Point is, you changed him. We’re a real family now. You changed him, and he changed us, and damn, I’d go so far as to say the whole village is changed. And it’s all thanks to you.

“I can’t tell you how proud of my little brother I am now. These past few years, he’s stepped up as Kazekage and worked hard to protect our people. Hell, he even held the chuunin exams in Suna! And he never stops talking about you. ‘Naruto this and Naruto that. What would Naruto do? I have to be a person that Naruto can acknowledge.’

“You should have heard him the week after you left after...after Chiyo...”

Temari had stood up at this point and was hauling Kankuro up by his arm.

“All right, that’s enough. It’s time to call it a night,” she said firmly.

The party wrapped up quickly, and Temari apologized to Naruto one last time before carrying Kankuro away over her shoulder. Their friends dispersed, and soon it was just Naruto and Gaara outside in the courtyard of the tea house.

“Well, that was fun. You know, I used to wish I had siblings when I was younger, but then eventually I came to think of my teammates like my siblings, and your siblings are your teammates, so that’s kind of ironic...”

Gaara looked across the courtyard as he listened. The small garden in front of them was dark and soft in the light of the moon. Bathed in the same light, Gaara’s face seemed to glow white, his bright green eyes and red scar fighting to command Naruto’s attention.

“Kankuro was right. I never would have considered them teammates or siblings until I met you,” Gaara said.

A jolt of nervous energy shot through Naruto. He leaned forward, unable to simply take a step forward but powerless against his desire to be closer.

“Gaara, I—”

Gaara turned to look at him, caught him staring. Naruto’s breath stuck in his throat. As Gaara’s lips parted to say something else, his skin started to prickle.

The moment was shattered by a door slamming open behind them. The sound of drunken revelers filled the air, and Naruto turned to see the last customers of the tea house stumbling out.

_Damn it!_

Behind them, one of the employees of the tea house stood with a broom.

“Closing time! I need to lock up the garden, so kindly get out!”

Naruto felt like falling face first into the ground. They’d been so close to—what exactly, he didn’t know—but something!

Sullenly, he allowed himself to be shooed away outside the gates of the tea house with Gaara and the group of drunkards.

“It’s late,” Gaara observed.

Naruto hated to hear him say that. He also subconsciously realized that he had said the same thing to Gaara last night, and kind of ruined that moment as well. Not that he ever imagined that Gaara was going to invite him back to his own room…

“You need your rest,” Gaara added, when Naruto didn’t reply.

Naruto was wondering if Gaara was going to invite him to stay again, and as the seconds stretched out, his muscles started to tighten up as he tried to think of a way that he could invite himself over without being too forward.

“I guess I should go then...unless I shouldn’t?”

Naruto felt like kicking himself. _Stupid, stupid, what does that even mean?_

“I don’t want you to,” Gaara said, “You can stay with me.”

Naruto broke into a grin. “You got it!”

And that was how Naruto ended up following the Kazekage back to his room for the second night in a row.

Like the previous night, Naruto jumped right into his usual nighttime routine. Change, wash, brush, lie down. By the time he got out of the washroom, Gaara had changed into sleep clothes as well, and set up the bedroll. He still wasn’t near it though, instead fixated by those damn reports again.

“Still not sleeping, huh?” Naruto asked. He settled into the soft fabric and immediately felt exhausted. How Gaara could sleep so little was beyond him.

“Maybe later,” Gaara said, not looking up from his papers.

“You weren’t here when I woke up,” Naruto mumbled, closing his eyes. He would fight to stay awake to hear Gaara’s voice, to wait until Gaara joined him in bed.

“You overslept, and I had a meeting. Neither of us have appointments in the morning tomorrow because it’s the day of remembrance. I’ll be here.”

Naruto rolled to his side, then his stomach. The blankets ever so slightly smelled like baked clay and sand. _Like Gaara_. Naruto lost a little ground in his battle against drowsiness.

Blanket Gaara was so warm and soft, and he wrapped himself tight as the lights dimmed to nothing. At some point the blanket grew edges, wasn’t as pliant or soft, and even warmer than before. Naruto fell asleep, still holding on.

Gaara held him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you wanna check out some cool traditional Japanese dancing, Tamagawa University has an awesome dance troupe and there are a bunch of videos of their performances on YouTube. 
> 
> Also, I totally imagined the maiko making Gaara and Naruto play the game "ohirakisan" which is where two people play rock-paper-scissors and the loser has to spread their legs a little. Whoever falls down/loses their balance first loses. I could not find a way to work that specific detail into this chapter though.


	3. Chapter 3

Gaara was impressed with how long Naruto slept. Still unable to sleep more than a few hours at a time, Gaara was able to review much of the paperwork that he had brought with him from Suna. As morning rolled around, and Naruto still wasn’t awake, Gaara sent a sand clone to get breakfast. He didn’t want to break his promise of being present when the Leaf ninja finally woke up.

He didn’t need to worry though, because the sand clone was back well before there were any signs of Naruto getting up. It was raining outside, and Gaara had the window cracked open to better hear the raindrops and feel the humidity. It hardly ever rained in the Sand Village, and he supposed the novelty of precipitation still hadn’t worn off for him.

As he ate his breakfast, he alternated between watching the sky and watching Naruto. For a ninja, he was unusually active in his sleep, rolling around, saying jibberish, and cuddling Gaara’s pillow. It was amusing, to say the least. Gaara found it endearing.

The rain was fitting for the solemn day that it was. Most shinobi would have no shortage of people to remember on a day like today, and Gaara was no different. He planned to light a candle for Chiyo, the old woman who had given her life for his, when he inevitably went to the shrine later. He knew he wasn’t going to light a candle for his father, he felt no emotion for the man, not even all these years later.

The death of Yashamaru was more complicated. If it hadn’t been for the very last memory Gaara had of his uncle, he had no doubt in his mind that thinking of him would bring back that stabbing feeling in his chest. It did anyway, dully, and it frustrated him a little to know that he still hurt about that man, about that entire situation. His uncle had tried to assassinate him, had told him that he had always hated him. Why could he still hurt for someone like that? Why were all the good memories that they had together not completely overwritten by the last words he’d uttered before killing himself?

If that wasn’t heavy enough, he also had a nagging thought in the back of his mind about Shukaku. Of course, the one-tail hadn’t died, but it was no longer with Gaara. The beast had never been a companion, but still, more often than not, Gaara noticed its absence in a negative way. In a lonely way. These times were always followed up with irritation, because he should no more miss Shukaku than he should his uncle.

Maybe it was just a product of his fucked up childhood that he had all these lingering attachments to such detrimental forces on his life.

Gaara looked over at Naruto again. He knew the blond had lost his fair share of comrades as well. Naruto was someone like him, who had started with no one in his corner. To have forged relationships and then watch them literally die...it was hard for Gaara to fathom.

Gaara was tempted to get back into the bedroll with Naruto. He’d done it a few times the night before, never for more than an hour or so. It was strangely overstimulating to be that close, to feel Naruto’s breath on his skin, to share their warmth.

He’d even gone so far as to put him arm around the other. It was strange to feel the rise and fall of someone else’s chest as they breathed, completely unconscious, completely vulnerable. The only thing Gaara could compare it to was the experience of having someone in his arms after choking them out. And being that Gaara didn’t rely on taijutsu very often, even that was not a very familiar occurrence.

Naruto had been the first person to acknowledge him as a human, when everyone else only saw him as a monster. Naruto had been his first friend. The first person to give him love. When Gaara’s life had been on the line, Naruto had been there. Reviewing these events helped explain Gaara’s unexpected need to be near him. To make sure he was safe.

Despite his misgivings with Yashamaru’s teachings, if there was anything, or anyone that Gaara felt comfortable to admit love for, it was Naruto.

Gaara cleaned up his breakfast and returned to his reports. He was almost through with them now, he could probably finish them by the end of today. He brushed away any remaining crumbs of thought in his mind, and focused solely on the papers in front of him.

He was about a quarter of the way through the second report when he heard a shift in Naruto’s breathing that indicated he was waking up. His heart rate had been gradually climbing over the past few hours, which was yet another sign that even sleep could not claim Uzumaki Naruto forever.

Gaara put down his work and watched as Naruto opened his eyes and sat up slowly. The blankets were wrapped around him like a snake and his hair was all over the place. The sight made Gaara’s chest throb.

“You’re here!” Naruto said, almost accusingly.

“I said I would be,” Gaara replied, “‘A shinobi should never go back on their word.’”

Naruto smiled when he heard Gaara quoting his nindo. It made Gaara smile too. He found himself inching towards the bedroll.

A knocking sound came from the door, followed by Temari’s voice.

“Gaara, there’s some–”

The door opened, and Temari immediately stopped talking. She froze, her face ashen, like a sand clone disintegrating in the wind as she gaped at the scene before her.

For a moment, no one moved. Then, Temari’s years of diplomacy training seemed to return to her, and she reversed back out of the room, shut the door, and said a weak, “Never mind.”

Gaara moved his gaze from the now closed door to Naruto, who was still looking at the space where Temari had been. His face and ears and neck, and even parts of his chest, had turned red. In what was a rare moment, he seemed to be at a loss for words.

Before Gaara could process anything, Naruto jumped up and pointed at the door. “We gotta stop her!” He lurched for the door, hindered by the blankets tangled all around him.

Sand crawled up the door, blocking his way. Naruto looked at Gaara with a frown.

“Going after her in your underwear isn’t going to help,” Gaara deadpanned.

Naruto looked down at his body with surprise, as if he had forgotten that he had slept in only his boxers. He laughed a little, nervously.

“Ah, I guess you’re right.”

As Naruto shucked off the blankets and began pulling on his clothes, Gaara felt a pinch of annoyance in his stomach. Why did Naruto care so much about what Temari assumed? Why did he need to correct her?

_Why couldn’t her assumptions be correct?_

As the sand wall in front of the door collapsed, Gaara sighed heavily. If she hadn’t barged in, maybe there would have actually been something worth being embarrassed about. Or maybe his uncle had been right all along, and no one could ever feel like that about Gaara.

“Aren’t you coming?” Naruto asked.

Gaara was farther away from him now, back at the window, staring at the unrelenting rain. His insides were churning, it felt like his guts were trying to claw their way out of a boiling pot. He should have never entertained the idea that something like that could ever have a place in his life. He let his mind go blank except for the sound of the rain. In that moment, the absence of Shukaku was painfully obvious.

“Gaara?”

“Just go,” Gaara said coldly. He didn’t want to be a part of what was happening anymore.

“Gaara.”

The voice called to him. It hurt him. He looked towards its owner, and it did funny things to his heart. When lightning flashed outside, he was grateful for the distraction. He still felt those clear blue eyes staring at him, but at least he didn’t have to see.

“I’m sorry if I embarrassed you, but it’s not like–I mean, I didn’t think...”

Gaara whipped his head around so fast that Naruto flinched.

“You didn’t embarrass me.”

Naruto took a step closer to him. The belt of his yukata was untied, and he still seemed wholly unprepared to go out in public. His expression was worried, his face so soft, so…

“I just...need a moment,” Gaara managed. He clenched his hands into fists, a habit he’d carried with him since childhood. Sand hissed around him, swirling like there was a desert wind kicking up.

_Fucking Yashamaru…_

“_Nobody could ever love a monster like you.”_

Naruto was waiting.

“Alone,” Gaara added.

More waiting. More lightning, and then thunder that shook the floorboards. Gaara heard Naruto sigh.

“Okay, but...” he seemed to be struggling with finding the right words. “I don’t wanna leave you like this. What if I...what if I take a bath, and then...you can come get me when you’re ready.”

Gaara nodded. Anything that would give him time to break down alone. A small, buried, part of him also appreciated Naruto’s concern.

~~

Gaara didn’t know how long it took, but eventually the feelings in his chest dwindled down to a dull wiggling that was tolerable. He realized that Naruto must be starving at this point, having missed breakfast, and he went and knocked on the door of the washroom and suggested that they go eat.

Naruto was ready in no time, and as suspected, chose to go to one of the nearby ramen shops. Gaara was certain that neither of his siblings would show up, and they seemed to have arrived at an off time for lunch anyway, since the shop was mostly empty.

Gaara stashed the umbrella they had shared at his feet while Naruto ordered several bowls of ramen at once. Before Gaara had even picked up his chopsticks, it seemed like Naruto had already finished two of them.

“So, can we talk about what happened with Temari now? Because first of all, I don’t want her to kill me,” Naruto said between bites.

Only Naruto would be able to lead this conversation while stuffing his face.

Gaara looked at the bowl of ramen in front of him, which Naruto had apparently ordered for him, and tried to determine whether he had any appetite. With the chaos going on inside of him, it was hard to tell how he felt about anything.

“She won’t kill you,” he said. He decided to try some of the ramen, to see if that would elucidate his current level of hunger. It didn’t.

“Well, I don’t want her mad at me. She’s pretty scary with her fan. And anyway, I don’t want to cause any problems for you either, being the Kazekage and all, and I’m a Leaf _genin_...”

Gaara felt a strange cognitive dissonance at that statement. Sure, technically Naruto had never passed the chuunin exams, but he was more skilled than most jounin that Gaara knew. Naruto was no ordinary Leaf genin, and furthermore, without him, Gaara most likely would not have become the Kazekage.

“It won’t be a problem. I’ll talk to her.”

Naruto did not seem very reassured.

“Do you think she’ll believe you?”

Gaara felt confused. “Why wouldn’t she? I have no reason to lie to her. She walked in and assumed we slept together–”

Naruto looked around worriedly, face turning red again, and made shushing sounds, despite no one being around. Even the shop keeper was back in the kitchen, trying to keep up with all the orders Naruto had placed.

“But nothing of the sort happened, so I’ll explain to her that she was mistaken. If it had, I would not hide it from her.”

Naruto stopped eating. Gaara wasn’t sure it was possible for Naruto to go anymore red, but it seemed he had.

“You–you would tell her–if we–?”

Gaara decided maybe he was a bit hungry after all. He took a few bites of his ramen before responding.

“If she asked, then yes. Unless...unless you didn’t want me to.”

Naruto’s face had frozen, and Gaara wasn’t sure that he had understood or even heard anything he’d just said. He had thought he’d been straightforward about it, so Naruto’s reaction did not make sense to him. Even considering the possibility of some kind of political scandal being made about them, Temari would never be part of it. The sand siblings were fiercely loyal to each other, and even Naruto had to realize that.

Naruto rubbed at his face with his hands, like he could brush all that red away. Like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing and needed to clear his eyes. When his vision didn’t change, he ran a hand through his hair, tugging on it as he reached the back of his head.

“Um...so...I guess, I just don’t understand. If talking to her about all of this isn’t a big deal, and...then...But, why were you so upset earlier? And–and also, last night...I mean, what _are_ you going to tell her?”

The question sunk through Gaara’s head, through his chest, and through his stomach like a cold stone. Answering honestly would, at the very least, give away his feelings for Naruto. He could probably talk around them, without addressing anything head-on, and Naruto might not notice—or give him an easy out—but was that what he wanted?

This festival only happened once every hundred years, and they were already three days in. Perhaps he could just put all of his cards on the table here. He didn’t expect Naruto to return his affections, so there wasn’t really anything for him to lose. On the other hand…

Gaara pushed the rest of his ramen away. He was finished with it. He needed more time to think. He wasn’t going to make his confession in this ramen shop, that was for sure.

He stood up, which seemed to alarm Naruto.

“I’ll be at the shrine about an hour before sundown to pay my respects. Will you be able to meet me?”

Eyes teeming with concern, Naruto nodded several times before responding affirmatively.

Gaara calculated the number of hours between now and then. It would be enough time for him to come to a decision.

“I’ll explain everything then.”

He put his money for the ramen on the table and left.

~~

When Gaara departed from the ramen shop, he had left his umbrella with Naruto. As a ninja of the desert, he somewhat enjoyed the feeling of rain on his skin, soaking and weighing down his clothes as he returned to the inn.

At the inn, he changed and took his clothes to the laundry room down the hall from his room. A short while after he removed his clothes from the dryer and returned back to his room, he heard knocking at his door.

“Gaara?”

It was Temari again. She didn’t open the door this time.

“Come in,” Gaara responded. He finished putting away his folded clothes, and turned to watch her crack open the door. She scanned the inside of the room, and only finding him, she poked her head in a little farther.

“Is anyone else here?” she asked quietly.

Gaara shook his head. “No.”

“Oh thank God.” From behind Temari came Kankuro’s voice.

Temari opened the door fully, and she and Kankuro entered. They both looked stiff, like someone had messed with their chakra points.

Gaara had a feeling that they would be staying for a while, so he went to the kitchenette in the room and began preparing tea. When it was ready, he brought it out, and they shared it at the small table where he’d eaten breakfast earlier.

He waited for whatever they inevitably were here to say.

After her first sip of tea, Temari gave a pointed look to Kankuro, who sighed.

“Gaara,” Kankuro began, clearly unhappy to be talking, “We realize this might be a little late, but we never thought–”

Temari elbowed him in the chest.

“Anyway, we’re not sure if anyone’s ever given you “the talk” so I guess that’s what this is.”

There was a pause, and the silence between them seemed shrill. Temari glared at Kankuro until he sighed again and then continued.

“Okay, so, sex. I guess, hell, I guess we’ll start with the basics.”

Gaara interrupted. “I know what sex is.”

Both Temari and Kankuro’s eyes snapped to Gaara. Temari looked pale. Kankuro slapped a hand over his face.

“Is it too late to have Baki do this?” he mumbled through his hand.

“W-we...we just want you to be safe, and we’re not sure how much you know since you didn’t have a regular academy education–”

“I learned the same curriculum from the various tutors that Yashamaru hired,” Gaara supplied.

Temari and Kankuro exchanged glances.

“There’s...this is something that...you can learn about it on paper, but...it’s a little more complicated in real life when there’s issues like...feelings, and….international security...” Each word seemed to bring Kankuro pain.

“Naruto and I didn’t have sex, if that’s what this is about,” Gaara stated calmly. He poured each of his siblings more tea. They were downing it like they wished it were alcohol.

“Well, that is kind of what this is about,” Temari admitted. She seemed slightly more at ease now. Kankuro still seemed highly uncomfortable. “Regardless of this morning, we should have talked to you about this a long time ago. Just...just in case.”

Kankuro cleared his throat.

“Right, so, you might know the mechanics of sex, but there’s more to it than that. There’s an emotional aspect to it that we’re worried...we’re worried that part might be difficult for you.”

“And then there’s the whole topic of consent,” Temari added quickly.

~~

Obviously, there was no easy way to cram years worth of social conditioning into Gaara in one afternoon, and Kankuro and Temari tired themselves out after a few hours. Either that, or they thought that they had hit the cap on Gaara’s emotional capacity for the day. Gaara was fine with this because he wanted at least some time alone before he saw Naruto again.

Gaara was getting ready to go to the shrine—an hour early, because it seemed like Temari and Kankuro were okay with camping out in his room indefinitely. He figured they wouldn’t follow him if he was going to the shrine to meditate over the memory of their dead mother.

Though he hadn’t let himself fully think about their mother earlier this morning, that hadn’t meant he had forgotten her on a day like this. He could never forget her, not with the sand that he carried on his back on a daily basis. Much like his memories of Yashamaru though, it wasn’t something he actively tried to think about, and when he did, it was...complicated.

He straightened his tie in the mirror. Unlike the previous two days, where he’d worn a yukata, today he was wearing all black, as if he were about to go to a funeral. It wasn’t exactly necessary, considering all of the graves of people he’d known were back in Suna, but it was part of the tradition of the festival. If he were more superstitious, he might have been reluctant to make any sort of confession on a day of mourning.

From the main room, he heard Temari and Kankuro talking idly.

“Uzumaki Naruto, huh?”

“We should have known. Looking back, it’s kind of obvious, isn’t it?”

Gaara had told them that he planned to meet Naruto sometime later. He’d been vague about the details, but he’d bluntly told them not to be in his room after he left for the shrine. It wasn’t as if he planned on bringing Naruto back to his room tonight. He wasn’t even sure he’d be on speaking terms with Naruto the following day. But, he was certain that when he did eventually return later in the night, he’d either want to be alone or only with Naruto.

His siblings most certainly thought he and Naruto were fucking. Nothing he said had changed their mind, and he didn’t care to try that hard to convince them anyway.

“Uzumaki Naruto...” Kankuro repeated, sounding dazed.

Gaara stepped out of the washroom, picked up his gourd, and went to join his siblings in the main room. At some point, one of them had gone down the hall to their room and brought back a bottle of sake that they’d been sharing.

Temari straightened as Gaara entered the room. Kankuro remained slumped down.

“I’m leaving,” Gaara said brusquely.

Temari stood up and approached him. She was smiling faintly, and up close, he was surprised to see that her eyes were misty. She put a hand on his shoulder—about as touchy-feely as their family got. He expected her to say something else about Naruto, or about how he was growing up or whatever. She didn’t.

“She loved you, you know,” she said, “So do I. So does Kankuro.”

She pulled him into a hug, and Gaara was shocked. Before he could react, she had already pulled away, leaving Gaara feeling unstable.

“Don’t worry,” she said, turning away from him to look at Kankuro, “We’ll make ourselves scarce.”

Gaara didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing. The uneasiness inside him swelled.

~~

Gaara lit incense and candles for his mother and Chiyo, and even Yashamaru. He’d gotten his fortune cast, and the small strip of omikuji paper claimed that a future blessing was in store. He tucked the fortune into his pocket, unconvinced.

As Naruto was chronically late to everything, Gaara didn’t expect him to be on time. Behind the shrine pavilion was a path into the woods that looped around a pond before disappearing into the trees. The rocks near the pond were all still damp from rain, although it had at least stopped for now. The water in the pond was muddy, probably churned up from the storm, but every now and then Gaara thought he saw a flash of scales from a fish.

He leaned against a tree and took a deep inhale of the thick humid air. The sun was getting low in the sky, to the point where it was just beginning to fight the trees for attention. Gaara knew he should be planning what he would say when Naruto finally showed up, but he was annoyingly preoccupied with the last thing Temari had said.

“_She loved you.”_

Over the years, his thoughts on the matter had changed. When he was little, he’d thought so. Yashamaru had told him so. But then Yashamaru had told him the opposite, and Gaara latched onto those words as if they were the truth. At some point he even thought his sand _was_ his mother—housed her spirit. Eventually he told himself it didn’t matter, she didn’t matter, and that he didn’t care how she felt about him. She hadn’t even ever met him.

Then why, at times like this, did he want so much to know the real answer? Why did he hope that she had loved him, in spite of it all?

He was deep in his mind when he felt a hum of chakra approaching him. Looking around wildly, he saw Naruto coming towards him, and sparks of anger ignited in his chest. He was mad at himself for not practicing _at all_ what he was going to say. By the time Naruto made it over to him, he had a headache.

“Hey, Gaara,” Naruto greeted him.

Gaara was busy fast-forwarding though his entire conversation with Temari and Kankuro, seeking any piece of information that might help him here. Uselessly, they seemed to have assumed that he and Naruto were farther along in this relationship business than what was actually the case, and they hadn’t gone over _confessing your love to the first friend you ever made_ and how one might deal with the soul crushing rejection that was a very real possibility that would so perfectly complement this day of mourning and sadness.

“Gaara?”

Gaara realized he hadn’t responded yet, and he looked up at Naruto and felt even less capable of forcing words out of his mouth. He was veritably certain that he’d never felt this much anxiety in his life, not even when he was fighting for his life with Shukaku—no, he’d been confident, and then peaceful—not even after he’d woken up and everything was so damn silent and there was suddenly so much more room in his head—not even—no, the closest feeling he could think of was every damn time he’d seen Naruto these past few days, and every time they’d just brush across some tender moment, and every time, like a bubble it would burst and nothing would come of it—

“Are you okay?”

Gaara was going to vomit if he didn’t sit down right now, which he did, at that stone that he had refused earlier. It was still damp, and it soaked into his pants, and he didn’t care because having wet pants was a simple and solvable problem, whereas the pounding heat in his head seemed interminable, and if Naruto didn’t want to speak to him after this then it was going to _hurt_ in the worst kind of impossible-to-fix way.

Naruto put the back of his hand against Gaara’s forehead, which was so hot by the way, but, impossibly, Naruto’s hand felt even hotter. Gaara couldn’t stand it. He grabbed Naruto’s wrist, and Naruto tensed. They locked eyes, and Gaara saw confusion staring back at him.

“Gaara,” Naruto’s voice was low, but warning.

Gaara let go, and Naruto backed away, diverting his eyes to the ground.

Lightning passed between them. For a while, neither of them spoke.

Gaara put his head in his hands, and bent over so that his elbows rested on his knees. His face was sticky with sweat.

“Listen,” Naruto began, and his voice was still low and serious. Dangerous.

Gaara didn’t understand what about this situation was causing him to react this way, but every instinct was telling him that he was at risk. He could feel the sand in his gourd bristling.

“Last night, when we were sleeping, I thought...” he trailed off, then shook his head, “No, it was even before that. Let me start over.”

Gaara was overwhelmed with heat and fear and something else that might have been embarrassment. His fingers dug into the skin of his skull, trying to keep him somewhat grounded while all these awful feelings scored their way through his insides.

“Actually, I’m not too good with words, so I better just say it.” Naruto took a deep breath. “I love you, you know? Like, I’d do anything to protect you. Like...”

His face scrunched up as he struggled to express himself.

“Anyway we’re friends, and as your friend, I feel like you should know that I kind of feel different than ‘friends’ about you. I mean, friends too, but different...”

“Sometimes I think, ‘I wanna hold Gaara’s hand’ or ‘I kind of wonder what it would be like if we kissed’ or um...well, last night...it was kind of like...we were cuddling...and that was really nice...”

“Also this festival only comes once every hundred years and is supposedly a big deal, so it seems like now would be as good a time as any to tell you all this stuff.

“And like, you don’t have to feel the same way. I mean that’s fine. Obviously that sucks for me, but, ehhh, I’m no stranger to rejection...”

“I guess Temari seeing us, and then you freaking out, and then me trying to stop her, and then you freaking out more...I guess that gave me the last push I needed to come clean.”

His voice was higher now, lighter, like it had shook off weight as he’d been speaking. The chakra in his body seemed to sigh as the tension left him. He was even smiling now, staring off into the distance, ostensibly proud of himself for confessing. Pink dusted his cheeks and his blue eyes sparkled. When their gazes met again, Gaara felt like his brain shut off.

“Well, that’s how I feel. What about you?”

Gaara’s brain was not responding.

“I don’t know.” He heard his own voice say, and for a second, he was afraid that he’d ruined everything.

But Naruto did not appear to be offended. His mouth twisted around, not in a frown, but perplexed.

“That’s fair,” he said slowly, “It’s confusing to me too...”

After another second, Naruto perked up again. “Well, this might be an easier question. What are we going to tell Temari?”

This was an easier question, because it had already happened. Gaara latched onto the familiar feeling of knowing the answer to something and tried to work it into his buzzing nerves.

“Actually, I spoke with her earlier. And Kankuro. They were concerned,” Gaara recalled.

By reviewing the events of earlier, he was able to separate himself from the current situation a little, which made him feel less like he was about to explode.

“You did? What’d you say? What’d they say?!”

Naruto’s face came closer to Gaara’s, but it was okay.

“They tried to give me some kind of crash course on safe sex, mostly. There was some mention of signs of healthy and unhealthy relationships, after I told them we weren’t having sex. I don’t think they believed me...”

Naruto fidgeted with the bottom of his sweatshirt. He was back in his regular orange and black today. Apparently no one had given him the memo about today’s dress code.

“...don’t know if I can ever look them in the eye...” Naruto was muttering to himself.

Gaara took a deep breath and centered himself. This was nothing like blocking out Shukaku. If anything, the self-control he’d learned back then from suppressing the demon was being pushed to its limits now.

“What you said before,” Gaara brought himself to say. If he focused on each word individually, it wasn’t so bad. “That it would be nice to hold hands...that you wonder what it would be like to kiss...I have those thoughts too.”

“Yeah?!” Naruto asked, leaning even closer.

“This may be obvious, but I have a hard time navigating my feelings...”

Naruto leaned back. “Well, that’s okay.”

The blond attempted to sit down on the rock next to Gaara, only to shoot up instantly and gawk at the wet spot on the back of his pants. “Awww man…”

Now that the sun had fully set, it was chillier. The dampness in his own clothes was more uncomfortable, and he had to imagine it was the same for Naruto.

He stood up, and Naruto immediately turned his attention on him. Gaara was almost knocked off his feet by the weight behind that stare. The heat in his face came back, full force.

Awkwardly, he raised his hand, holding it out for Naruto to take, if he wanted.

“Will you come back with me?”

Naruto looked at the hand, then at Gaara. He grinned.

“Of course!”

He put his hand over Gaara’s and laced their fingers together. Naruto’s hand was so warm and so solid, his grip firm. Even something as small as this made Gaara feel breathless.

The wind picked up, and then Gaara felt the rain start again. He looked at Naruto, who was looking back at him. Rain slid down his skin, and Gaara felt he was melting along with it.

“Ready?” Naruto asked.

Gaara nodded, and they were off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Naruto spent that afternoon getting psyched up by Sakura and Sai to confess his love already. Mou kokuhaku shinakyattebayo!!


	4. Chapter 4

Naruto woke up and was surprised to see Gaara in front of him. Not only that, but even more surprising, Gaara seemed to be sleeping.

_He said he doesn’t sleep much, so I shouldn’t wake him up…_

It became Naruto’s goal to stay as motionless as possible, despite stillness being against his very nature. It hadn’t even been thirty seconds, and his whole body was starting to itch. If he could just move a little–

Gaara shifted, and Naruto froze.

_He’s still sleeping! No more moving, Naruto!_

Besides, if he didn’t move, then Gaara wouldn’t get up and go do something (probably important) that would require being farther away from Naruto than he was currently. And he was currently pretty close.

Sunlight was streaming in from the window, which meant that it was morning. Was Naruto supposed to be anywhere today? He vaguely remembered something, but not enough to be worried about it. Whatever it was, clearly this was more important.

Naruto felt himself smile as he watched Gaara sleep. Not that he was being creepy about watching him sleep or anything, but in his determination not to move, there wasn’t really a whole lot else to look at. Naruto didn’t mind looking.

Without the sand armor that Gaara wore most of his waking hours, his skin was so smooth. Impossibly smooth for a ninja, who would usually be decently covered with scars and bruises from combat and the daily wear and tear of forging through various terrain and weather conditions. Smooth and completely free of any imperfection and probably really soft.

_Yes_, Naruto decided, Gaara’s skin definitely looked very soft and he would have to find out later. He supposed he might have brushed against Gaara’s skin sometime in the night, but the fact that he had been asleep really detracted from the experience.

Last night, after coming back to the room, Naruto had gone straight to sleep. He had been stewing with anxiety ever since he had left Gaara’s room after the whole Temari thing, about what he was going to say and how he was going to say it. About what Gaara might say. (Also slightly that Temari was still going to come out of nowhere and chop him in half with her fan…)

By the time he actually got to saying everything, he was exhausted. When Gaara didn’t outright reject him, it made him feel this warm glow that definitely aided in his sleepiness. So, despite what Temari, Kankuro, Sakura, Sai, and Ino probably thought, nothing worthy of one of Ero-Sennin’s books had occurred.

As Naruto traced his gaze across Gaara’s sleeping form now, he felt a weird sensation in his chest. He could only describe it as similar to the feeling that he had when his fingernails got too long, and then he cut them really short, and it felt weird touching things with the tips of his fingers. He felt like that, except the feeling was on his heart, and instead of happening when he touched things, it happened whenever he looked at or thought of Gaara. So, it was pretty constant this morning.

Something else that was constant this morning…_and probably worthy of being in one of Ero-Sennin’s trash books..._

Naruto felt his face go warm. It wasn’t his fault, sometimes he just woke up like this, and he wasn’t being a pervert because it’s not like he did it on purpose, and even though he did like Gaara in that way, he wasn’t gonna be weird about it, and–and–

Luckily he was under all of the blankets, so even if Gaara woke up, it’s not like the would see what was going on in Naruto’s boxers.

His body was really being uncooperative this morning. First _that_, then the itchiness, and—he was starting to realize that he kind of really had to go to the bathroom.

But Gaara was still sleeping (which he had trouble with) and how could Naruto risk moving (nothing he did was graceful—stealth was not his specialty) and inevitably waking him up? He couldn’t! He _wouldn’t_!

Gaara opened his eyes, and Naruto nearly sighed in relief.

Gaara brought one of his hands to rub at his face, eventually letting it fall right between them.

Naruto really wanted to reach out and grab it (_surely this was an invitation to?_), but he also really had to go take care of _things_.

“Morning, Gaara! I—I have to go to the bathroom!”

Naruto leapt up and dashed to the washroom, hopefully fast enough that Gaara didn’t notice anything.

By the time he finished taking care of his various bodily functions and returned to the room, Gaara was already up, dressed for the day, and folding away the bedroll.

Disappointment materialized in the pit of his stomach.

Gaara seemed to notice.

“I have a meeting I’m supposed to attend soon,” he explained, “I’ll be tied up most of the day, but after that...we could meet at sundown again?”

_Sundown_?! He was really going to be busy all day? Naruto supposed it wasn’t that surprising, given that Gaara was the Kazekage and all, but damn. He wanted to spend a little more time with the person he just confessed to last night. This was already the fourth day of the festival…

“Do you have any meetings tomorrow morning?” Naruto asked.

Gaara frowned, and Naruto realized he must have thought that his offer to meet at sundown had been rejected.

“I just mean, if you don’t, we can stay up really late,” Naruto rushed to add.

The frown disappeared, and Gaara seemed to consider this.

“But you need sleep,” Gaara insisted.

“I’ll sleep during the day! I mean, I’m pretty sure I’ll have time...”

Gaara nodded. A small smile inched across his face, and then he stepped forward into Naruto’s space. He held out his hand, which Naruto eagerly took hold of. The sand armor was back already, but Naruto could feel the warmth from Gaara’s hand anyway.

At some point, while Naruto was busy mooning over their entwined hands, Gaara had reached out and touched his face. Naruto’s thoughts went to mush, and then he felt Gaara trace along his whisker birth marks.

His stomach clenched involuntarily. No one had ever..._willingly_...

Gaara said something, but Naruto didn’t hear because he was too caught up with some strange new thought about the kyuubi inside him. Gaara didn’t mind the kyuubi, he wasn’t afraid of it or disgusted by it. He didn’t fear Naruto losing control.

It was a strange pinwheel of thoughts that brought him back to his early childhood, where people on the street had stared and whispered, shopkeepers throwing him out, parents ushering their children away.

It was as if Gaara was touching a memory—a memory that he would share, being the jinchuuriki of the Sand Village.

When he pulled away and set about putting on his traditional Kage coat and hat, Naruto felt a sting of gloominess slowly creep up his throat.

“So, at sundown. Do you want to meet here?” Gaara asked.

Naruto blinked, pulling himself out of the weird nostalgia. His throat still felt a little irritated.

“Yeah...yeah!” Naruto agreed.

Gaara smiled again, bringing Naruto back to his former state of mush.

~~

Naruto went back to his own room, and Sai wasn’t there. Naruto figured he was probably supposed to be wherever his teammate was right now, but he couldn’t remember what Sakura had told him yesterday. The big ceremony with the daimyo was on the seventh day, so Naruto knew that at least Tsunade-baachan wouldn’t kill him for missing whatever was going on today.

He climbed into the top bunk, his designated bed, and flopped down. Ironically, this was the first time he had lain in this bed, despite three nights having passed. _Sai sure was one lucky bastard, getting this whole room to himself._

Naruto’s thoughts flitted around images of Gaara. No one was here, so he was free to be as pervy as he wanted (hypothetically speaking, of course!). He had plenty of memories of Sakura yelling at him or hitting him to keep him in check.

One such snippet of memory was as recent as yesterday. Naruto had been asking for advice on what to say to Gaara, and Sakura had given him a grave warning.

“_It’s likely that you’re the first person to give him this kind of attention, so he might be confused. Don’t take advantage of that!”_

Naruto would never! Besides, Gaara was strong and also the Kazekage. Naruto trusted that he would be able to tell him if he did something wrong.

_Everyone else does it all the time, so it can’t be that difficult…_

He turned his thoughts to their meeting later and how that would go. He thought about how nice it would be to hold hands and maybe kiss Gaara. His lips were probably even softer than Naruto imagined.

After kicking around similar fantasies in his head for a while, one idea caused Naruto to sit bolt upright...and bang his head on the ceiling because the top bunk was not that far from it. He rubbed his head where he had smashed it, then he rubbed at his face which was hot from embarrassment at his idea.

He decided to implement it anyway.

“Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!”

Naruto often created shadow clones. Sometimes he created shadow clones that looked like other people. This particular shadow clone…

“You can’t be serious,” Gaara-clone said.

While identical to Gaara in appearance, the shadow clone was all Naruto in personality.

“Shut up! You’re me, so part of you wants to do this too!”

Gaara-clone scowled in an exaggerated manner, though his face had turned pink. It was odd to see Gaara’s face so animated.

“We gotta practice for tonight...just in case!” Naruto proclaimed.

The Gaara-clone’s eyes and mouth were still scrunched up. He didn’t seem to like the idea, or at least, not his role.

“Easy for you to say,” Gaara-clone huffed, “You get to see Gaara. I just see...us.”

Naruto grimaced. “Let’s not think about this too much.”

The clone sighed, and then shook his head back and forth like he was shaking away the doubt. When he was done, he had achieved a neutral expression that Gaara actually wore sometimes.

Naruto took a big gulp of air, like he was about to jump in a lake, then he reached for Gaara-clone’s face. It was soft, mostly because the clone took on whatever form Naruto imagined. He cupped the clone’s cheek, his thumb brushing against some of the clone’s red hair. As Naruto smoothed his thumb across Gaara-clone’s ear, the clone closed his eyes.

_This is probably it…here goes nothing!_

Naruto puckered his lips and leaned closer to the clone. Their lips smushed together, and Naruto held his breath.

_This isn’t weird. Pretend it’s Gaara._

Now that they were pressed together, he wasn’t sure what to do. Should he move away? Should he do something else with his mouth? Also, where was his other hand supposed to go??

The Gaara-clone pulled away.

“We’ve got to do better than that.”

“Oh yeah?!” Naruto asked indignantly, his volume spiking.

The clone ignored the outburst.

“Keep this hand here, and put this one there.”

He placed Naruto’s free hand on the clone’s hip.

“Okay now, uh, be better at kissing.”

“How?!”

“If I knew, you would know!”

Naruto huffed. Maybe this wasn’t working due to the fact that this was a clone and not actually Gaara.

“Let’s try one more time.”

Naruto leaned in again. This time, instead of just pressing their lips together, he angled it so that Gaara-clone’s top lip was between both of his. Mechanically, this already seemed better…

Sai walked in the door. The clone disappeared in a puff of smoke, but it was already too late. The two shinobi’s eyes met for a very awkward moment.

Sai, keeping his expression completely blank, simply stepped backwards out of the doorway and shut the door in front of him.

“Wait, it’s not what you think!” Naruto cried, leaping out of bed and crashing into the door. He turned the handle, flung open the door, then vaulted into Sai, who he’d expected to have run off already.

Both ninja tumbled to the floor.

“Owwww,” Naruto groaned.

“Naruto. Why.” Sai muttered, picking himself up off the floor, “I respect your private time, but. Just. Why.”

Naruto rolled to one side, then sat up and brushed himself off. He looked up at Sai and narrowed his eyes.

“What did you see?”

“Enough.”

“Agree to never speak of this again?”

“Gladly,” Sai replied flatly.

“It wasn’t what you think, you know. It wasn’t Gaara. Not that it couldn’t have been. I mean maybe later, we might–but–I–uh–”

“Naruto,” Sai said, an out-of-place smile appearing on his face. Naruto recognized this to be a sign of annoyance. “You are literally breaking the agreement _you_ just proposed.”

“Okay, okay,” Naruto replied, “Just don’t think I was up to anything weird or pervy or anything because I wasn’t. Just—just forget it okay?!”

Sai sighed. His uncanny smile remained and did nothing to put Naruto at ease.

“Where were you anyway?” Naruto asked pointedly, like Sai had been the one off doing something questionable.

“There was a gathering for shinobi and civilians. The shinobi were there to show off, basically, but also answer any questions the townspeople had. It was informal enough, but you probably should have gone.”

_Ohhh yeah, that’s what Sakura was talking about yesterday!_

“Was Tsunade-baachan there?” Naruto asked quickly.

“Obviously she was there. But I don’t think she cared about your absence. Sakura will probably give you hell, but what else is new?”

Naruto considered this. While he did, Sai moved toward the room.

“Can I go in now? I kind of wanted to relax before the fireworks tonight.”

Naruto snapped out of his musings and looked up at Sai sharply. “Fireworks? There are gonna be fireworks tonight?”

Sai shook his head. “Seriously Naruto, are you even at the same festival as the rest of us? He’s really fucking your brains out, isn’t he?”

Naruto reddened. “Shut up!”

~~

Naruto was on his way to meet Gaara—early this time, since he had made Gaara wait almost an hour yesterday, and he didn’t mean to be late, it just somehow always happened–

“Naruto!”

Upon hearing Sakura shouting after him, Naruto doubled his pace.

This was exactly the kind of thing that would make him late. How did this always happen to him? Even leaving early, he could not outrun lateness.

“Damn it, Naruto, wait!”

After a few seconds of internal debate, Naruto slowed down and then stopped. Maybe this would only take a minute. Maybe Sakura had some really important advice to give him.

He turned around and saw Sakura and Ino sprinting towards him. Ino was holding a bouquet of flowers. When they reached him, Ino shoved the flowers towards him.

“What the hell, Naruto?” Sakura panted. “We’re trying to help you here!”

Ino was also out of breath.

Naruto took the flowers from her uncertainly.

“They’re for Gaara,” Ino said, her chest heaving, “Well, for you to give to Gaara.”

Naruto looked at the bunch of flowers he was holding. He was no expert on flowers, especially not like Ino, whose family owned a flower shop. Nevertheless, he thought they looked nice. The main feature of the bouquet seemed to be these long blue and purple cone shaped flowers, whose heads bent down like they were snoozing. At the end of the cones, the petals flared out like little skirts. They were pretty cool, as far as flowers went. The rest of the flowers were blue, pink, purple, and white.

“Do you think Gaara will like it?” Naruto asked, feeling dumb.

“He should!” Ino exclaimed, “Those flowers in the middle only grow in the Land of Rivers, and they only bloom for one week twice a year!”

Sakura glared at him. “Also,” she said, in her most know-it-all voice, “If you had ever paid attention in ninja history class at the academy, you would know that this flower was a favorite of Reto-sama, the first Kazekage.”

It seemed like such an obscure piece of trivia to remember. Naruto had no recollection of this fact, or if he had ever learned something like this in the first place. For all he knew, Sakura was making this up. But the flowers were pretty, so he figured they would be fine.

“Do you think Gaara will know that?” he asked.

Ino put her face in her hand.

“Why do we even try to help you?” Sakura muttered.

Naruto laughed nervously. “No, no, I mean, thank you!”

“Sai said you were worried about tonight, and I thought these would help,” Ino said, having regained her composure. “I’m sure you don’t have a romantic bone in your body, so it’s really the least we could–”

“He said that?” Naruto interrupted, alarmed, “What else did he say?”

Sakura and Ino looked at each other with confused expressions. It seemed like they didn’t know. Naruto exhaled with relief.

“Never mind! Anyway, I have to go now—don’t wanna be late! Thanks for the flowers!”

~~

Gaara did appear to like the flowers, although whether the whole history behind them was true or not, Naruto was unable to discern.

“Thank you,” Gaara said.

Naruto couldn’t tell if it was a trick of the light or something to do with the flowers so close to Gaara’s face, but he suspected that the Kazekage’s cheeks were a little flushed.

“So, um, there’s going to be fireworks, uh, if you want to go and stuff,” Naruto stuttered.

Gaara gave him a small smile.

“Sure. I’ll just put these inside first...”

Naruto followed Gaara into the inn, up to his room. When Gaara opened the door, Naruto noticed that the lights were on for some reason, though dimmed.

He entered the room after Gaara and looked around. Candles flickered all around the room, illuminating the room to its current dim state. At the small table by the window, there was a steaming pot of tea, and two rice paper sheets topped with intricate flower-shaped wagashi sweets. In the middle of the room, the bedroll had been laid out impeccably with no wrinkles in the blankets.

Naruto felt very, very suddenly hot.

Gaara returned from the kitchenette with the flowers in a vase full of water. He set them at the table with the tea.

“Um, Gaara, did you—did you have another idea? We don’t have to go to the fireworks...”

Gaara winced. He looked around the room before settling his eyes on Naruto.

“This was...more or less my sister’s doing...”

Naruto eyed the steaming tea and the sweets. Out of the corner of his eye, he eyed the bedroll–

_But not in a pervy way! It was really comfortable! He’d slept on it the last three nights in a row, so he should know. That it was very comfortable. And inviting._

“It’d be a shame for the tea to go to waste,” he said finally.

“I’ve seen fireworks before,” Gaara agreed.

The two approached the table and sat adjacent from each other. Gaara poured Naruto tea first before filling his own cup.

Naruto thanked him, and with trembling hands he picked up his teacup. It was still too hot, so he waited. As he watched Gaara pouring his own tea, the atmosphere of the room weighed down on him, making him anxious.

“So, how was your day of meetings?” Naruto prompted, hoping that conversation would distract him a little so he could lighten up.

“You weren’t at the shinobi-civilian gathering,” Gaara said, stopping abruptly at the end of his sentence. He seemed surprised about what he had said.

Naruto felt a pang of guilt, and then a hot rush of shame as he thought about what he’d actually been doing instead. “Sorry. Sakura-chan told me yesterday, but I completely forgot about it.”

Gaara was already drinking his tea. _Wasn’t it still too hot?_ Naruto did not attempt to try his own. With his luck, he’d end up spitting it out all over himself or something equally humiliating.

“I was hoping I’d see you there,” Gaara stated. “I saw that girl again.”

Naruto was confused. “Huh?”

“From the first night. The child who ran into me. I saw her again.”

Naruto’s memory clicked into place, and he felt another twinge of guilt for not going to the stupid gathering. Gaara had been so upset that first night...and if he saw the girl again…

“She gave me an origami crane. She said she hoped it would make it up to me, for her running into me. She said she had been so embarrassed for being so careless in front of the Kazekage,” Gaara said, looking at the tea in his hands, “She wasn’t afraid of me.”

Naruto grinned. “See? I told you! You’re a great Kazekage, and everyone knows it!”

Gaara put his teacup down, but continued to stare at it. Naruto’s confusion returned. For something that he assumed Gaara would have been happy about, he didn’t seem especially thrilled.

Gaara slid his hand across the table, without looking at it. Naruto reached for it, and as he took it, Gaara caught him in his stare. Naruto couldn’t make out his expression, but he could feel his own heart in his throat.

“Is it wrong of me to miss being a jinchuuriki?” Gaara asked.

Naruto’s blood cooled significantly. He thought of Gaara, half covered in sand, his eyes wild, literally foaming at the mouth at the chuunin exams. He’d fought with all the strength he’d had because he knew exactly the pain that Gaara was feeling.

It was true that over the years, Naruto had ended up telling a lot of people that they didn’t have to go down a certain path. With Gaara it was different. With Gaara, he knew that path first hand.

Another image came to him, and he was pulled into the memory. Gaara’s dead weight in his arms. Gaara—without Shukaku—lifeless, as Naruto pleaded Sakura if there was anything, _anything_ she could do to heal him. Chiyo performing the resurrection jutsu, and Naruto supplanting her chakra with his own.

Gaara waking up.

Gaara’s eyes meeting Naruto’s.

“Naruto?”

Naruto gulped down his tea. He felt cold and clammy all of the sudden. It had been traumatic for him, of course it was worse for Gaara.

“I get it,” Naruto said, “It’s not like you had a choice in the matter. It must have been...hard...for Shukaku to be suddenly gone like that.”

Gaara flipped his hand over, so they were palm to palm. His fingers curled around Naruto’s hand, warm and strong and alive.

“Would you miss the nine-tails?”

Naruto placed his free hand on his stomach, over the seal mark. He’d never really thought about losing the kyuubi. He knew that if the tailed demon was forcibly removed that the jinchuuriki would die, so it wasn’t practical to imagine life without the imprisoned beast.

“Yeah, I would.” Naruto’s voice was soft. He looked up at Gaara, his eyes shining.

Gaara squeezed his hand and looked down.

“Sorry for bringing that up. I don’t know why I did.”

“It’s fine,” Naruto assured him. “It’s okay...”

Gaara picked up his flower-shaped sweet, popped it into his mouth, and finished his tea. He pushed his teacup away, and then both of his hands were holding Naruto’s.

“Thank you,” he said in a low voice, which caused a weird tickling sensation in Naruto’s nose.

Gaara took a deep breath, evidently ready to change the subject.

“Temari would be kicking me right now if she knew how much I brought down the mood. After all her hard work...”

Gaara smiled and tilted his head to capture Naruto’s stare. Naruto blinked, not realizing that he had been focused on the table.

“Ah, yeah,” Naruto said, taking a breath to calm himself, “We could try to catch the end of the fireworks…?”

Gaara nodded. “Sure.”

~~

By the time they made it to the field designated for viewing the fireworks, there was no one else there and no fireworks in the sky.

“Damn it!” Naruto exclaimed, kicking the ground with frustration.

Gaara said nothing, but began to lay out the blanket that they had brought anyway. Gaara’s room had plenty of extras, so it wouldn’t be missed when they slept later.

“I guess it’s nice enough out,” Naruto sighed, defeated. He joined Gaara, sprawling on his back on the blanket, and drew his gaze across Gaara’s line of sight. The sky above them was painted across with glittering stars.

“There’s Tsuzumiboshi,” Gaara said, pointing at the sky.

Naruto tried to distinguish which cluster of stars Gaara was referring to, but he had never been great at identifying constellations. He linked a few stars together that sort of could resemble a tsuzumi drum, and he nodded.

“Over there is Take no Fushi.”

Naruto hadn’t known that Gaara was so knowledgeable about astronomy. He watched as Gaara’s eyes scanned the sky, mapping stars and finding patterns in the infinite dots. He seemed completely at ease, identifying the shapes and patterns that he’d probably seen countless sleepless nights before.

Naruto inched closer to Gaara, so their shoulders were touching. In an attempt to impress Gaara, he pointed to the brightest star he saw.

“I know that one. That’s Hokusei!”

Gaara turned his head and smiled softly at Naruto. It seemed almost...sympathetic. Then, he took Naruto’s wrist and gently moved his hand so that he was pointing at another star.

“Actually, that’s Hokusei,” he corrected, “The one you were pointing at is Natsuhiboshi…which isn’t actually a star. It’s another name for Kasei, the planet.”

“Ahhhh, right.” Naruto laughed self-consciously. He was glad it was dark, so Gaara couldn’t see him blushing.

As Naruto lowered his arm, Gaara’s hand slipped into his. For a while, neither of them spoke. Crickets chirped and wind rustled the trees around them. The stars and the moon continued to illuminate the couple beneath them.

The memory that Naruto had unearthed earlier—that awful dead weight in his arms—rose to his mind unbidden. His stomach turned, and he tried to shove that thought, that feeling, far down. He focused on the faintest pressure of Gaara’s shoulder against his. He felt the urge to hold Gaara.

Naruto turned on his side, facing Gaara. He lowered his head so that his nose was pressed into Gaara’s shoulder. Slowly, the snaked his arm across Gaara’s midsection until his fingers curled under Gaara’s back. He wanted to eradicate the muscle memory he had of that dead weight, and replace it with this feeling of Gaara in his arms, alive and happy and well.

But then Gaara shifted and squirmed, and Naruto retracted his arm. Gaara sat up. Fear shot through Naruto’s veins. Had he done something wrong?

_Was Gaara upset?_

“Naruto,” Gaara said. His tone seemed almost grave.

Naruto wanted to curl up into a ball and vanish. _How had this gone wrong?_ Before he could fully freak out, he tightened the muscles in his stomach and forced himself to breathe normally. There would be no salvaging this situation if, in a state of panic, he somehow made things even worse.

Before he could respond, Gaara spoke again.

“I want to kiss you.”

The calming breathing technique was simultaneously saving his life and going out the window. Naruto hauled himself to a seated position and stared at Gaara with wide eyes.

“O-okay,” he somehow managed to say.

Naruto barely had time to recover from the emotional whiplash from thinking he fucked everything up to Gaara’s sudden confession. Gaara was shuffling closer to him, on his knees, and Naruto tried to remember how to move his limbs.

This is what he had been practicing for earlier! Not that _that_ had gone well, but…

Gaara’s knees were touching his now. Gaara put one of his hands on Naruto’s shoulder, steadying himself as he leaned forward.

Naruto was able to guide his own hands so that one was hovering on Gaara’s hip and the other was just grazing his cheek. Though barely touching, Naruto handled Gaara with the same caution that he would a freshly sharpened shuriken.

It was Gaara who kept leaning forward until there was no more space between them. Naruto felt like he’d blacked out, only to realize that at some point he’d closed his eyes. He left them closed to focus all of his attention on the warm pressure on his mouth, how Gaara’s teeth pressed up behind his soft lips as he continued to push forward against Naruto.

Naruto felt magnetized to the other shinobi. He didn’t dare move or breathe. His lungs were tight, and the fingertips he had against Gaara’s cheek were tingling. Warmth flooded his chest, like the pressure had caused all his veins and arteries to burst.

Gaara moved ever closer, his lips splitting. He took a small but sharp breath and gently pulled away, breaking the kiss. His hand remained on Naruto’s shoulder.

Naruto opened his eyes and studied Gaara’s face. His eyes were wide, and his mouth was still slightly open. Something about his expression made Naruto’s heart shiver.

“So...um, what did you think?” Naruto asked lamely. His hands were still just barely making contact with Gaara. They’d just kissed, but still, Naruto hesitated.

Gaara closed his mouth, then opened it, then closed it again. All the while, he never took his eyes off Naruto. The look made Naruto feel like his bones were dissolving.

With the hand that wasn’t already on his shoulder, Gaara put his hand over Naruto’s so that he was properly cupping his cheek.

“Can we do it again?”

Naruto let out a shaky breath that was almost a laugh. “As many times as you want.”

Gaara leaned forward again, and Naruto to meet him, involuntarily. He could feel the heat radiating off of Gaara’s face as he very delicately placed an even gentler kiss on his lips. He pulled away again, though not as far as last time.

“You can come closer, you know?” Naruto said in a soft voice.

He let his hand that was just glancing Gaara’s hip rest there fully, pulling him closer ever so slightly. Gaara obliged by sliding forward into Naruto’s lap, straddling his waist. Naruto leaned back and removed his hand from Gaara’s cheek to plant it on the ground behind them for additional support.

Gaara’s hands riffled through the blond’s hair as he leaned ever farther forward. Naruto pressed his face into Gaara’s chest, mesmerized by the tingling sensation on his scalp. He relaxed into Gaara’s touch, sinking into the rhythm of Gaara’s breathing and the shushing sound of the fabric of their clothes as they moved together.

Gaara sighed into his hair, and Naruto felt ripples of warmth radiate down his neck and shoulders and through his arms. Heat was growing between them, and Naruto arched his back, pressing his chest right into the blaze. When Gaara moved, he followed. When Gaara paused to breathe, he inhaled deeply, losing himself to the scent of heady desert winds.

He felt his forehead protector being undone and then removed. Fingertips combed from front to back of his hair, over and over, and then circled around to hold his jaw. Naruto felt Gaara’s thumbs brush over his whisker marks, causing his heart rate to jump. He opened his mouth to breathe ragged breaths as Gaara tilted his chin upwards and kissed him again.

The heat between them grew agonizing, and Naruto felt the elbow of his supporting arm weaken. When Gaara’s tongue found his, it buckled completely, bringing Naruto flat on his back with Gaara on top of him. Their kiss turned messy. Fueled by instinct, Naruto wrapped his arms around Gaara, pulling their bodies flush against one another. It felt so _good, _Naruto barely knew what was happening

Their bodies writhed against one another, trying to get closer, trying to establish a rhythm of push and pull. It didn’t matter if their teeth clicked together, or if a tongue slipped out. All that mattered was getting more, getting closer, stoking the fire burning them both. They didn’t even break away to breathe anymore, just gasping here and there, panting hot breath against skin slick with sweat and saliva.

A small part in the back of Naruto’s mind nagged him that Gaara’s weight was on top of his hips and…

_He had to have noticed…_

But even that didn’t matter because the feelings had overtaken him. His fingers clawed into the fabric on Gaara’s back, pressing their bodies ever tighter together. Between kisses, he gasped and sighed and shuddered. It took every last bit of his attention that was not focused on Gaara to keep his hips from squirming.

Eventually they were both struggling to catch their breath more than they were kissing. At this point, Gaara pulled back and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.

Naruto turned his head to the side, looking away from the green-eyed man on top of him who was outlined with stars. The blanket was cold against his cheek, and there was sweat under his collar.

Even the air felt cool to his lungs as he took a few heaving breaths. Each gulp of air brought down his temperature a little. When the fuzziness in his head began to die off, he looked back up at Gaara, who was just watching him.

“Are we done now?”

Naruto smiled weakly. “Ah-aha, if you wanna be.”

Gaara swept his eyes down Naruto’s body. If he hadn’t been sitting on him, Naruto would have twitched. He might have anyway, and he hoped Gaara hadn’t felt it. Gaara brought his eyes back up to the blue. “I don’t know,” he stated plainly.

The admission made Naruto feel an unexpected sense of relief.

“Me neither,” he confessed.

Gaara moved off of Naruto, eventually bringing his body so that they were lying shoulder to shoulder again. Their hands found one another and strung together with ease.

“I, uh, I didn’t make you uncomfortable, did I?” Naruto asked. The space where Gaara had been felt cold, even though Naruto’s entire body was still smoldering.

“No.” Gaara squeezed his hand to punctuate his point.

“Ah, so...did you...did you like it?” He squeezed his eyes shut, like his sight had anything to do with being able to hear how Gaara would answer.

Gaara turned the question around on him. “Did you?”

Naruto relaxed his eyes, but kept them closed, reviewing his memories of the past few minutes. “Of course!”

He heard Gaara breathe out sharply.

_Laughter...or a sigh of relief?_

“I did too.”

Naruto grinned so wide that his cheeks hurt and his eyes closed tightly again. He laughed and laughed, full and deep, and any remaining tension slipped away. “Ah man, that was—that was amazing! So amazing, I can’t believe it...”

Gaara didn’t need to respond. A contented glow emanated from him. He played with Naruto’s fingers as he listened to his partner sing their praises.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to post last weekend, but I was sick (technically I'm still sick, but I guess more manageably so).
> 
> Also, I watched the episode where they show Gaara's infinite Tsukuyomi dream, and I almost died! He just wants a happy loving family...and Naruto TT_TT
> 
> ALSO (several episodes later) Naruto's reverse harem sexy no jutsu??? And him saying that he "practices it more than Rasengan." What? When?? Why?? (Obviously this is going into my case files of evidence that 1. Naruto totally likes dudes too and 2. Naruto would definitely make out with a shadow clone if he hasn't already lol).
> 
> I'm at about episode 470 now so...almost there!


	5. Chapter 5

Gaara was jostled from sleep by Naruto thrashing around in his. Over the past few days, Gaara learned that it was normal for the Konoha ninja to be such an active sleeper, so he wasn’t particularly surprised by this outburst. If anything, he was more impressed with the amount of sleep he’d been able to get this week—typically he’d be lucky to get even two hours a night.

Naruto made some kind of whimpering noise and turned to his side violently. Gaara felt himself smiling as he looked at his sleeping partner. He felt full of the morning light that was spilling through the window and across their bodies.

He brushed his fingertips across Naruto’s cheek, which was something that he assumed he was now entitled to do, based on last night. Even just this small action made him feel giddy. When Gaara thought about all of the physical intimacy he’d shared with others in his life, there was only last night and this morning.

Naruto tensed again, his jaw clenching. He rolled onto his back, his shoulders jerking with an impressive force from someone unconscious. His face was scrunched up in a grimace. He mumbled something that suspiciously sounded like, “Wake up.”

Immediately, Gaara recognized that Naruto was having a nightmare. He placed his hand on Naruto’s shoulder, applying and releasing a small amount of pressure in hopes of waking him.

Another thing that Gaara had noticed over the past few days was that Naruto was an impressively heavy sleeper.

He shook him gently, applying a bit more force this time. “Naruto...it’s okay...”

Naruto woke up gasping and flailing. He looked at Gaara with wide eyes, full of fear and...anguish? A split second later and he had leapt on top Gaara, scooping him up in his arms.

“You’re alive!” Naruto cried, smooshing Gaara’s face into his chest.

Gaara tried to breathe but found it hard with his face against Naruto’s skin and his lungs constricted by Naruto’s tight embrace. He could faintly hear the rattle of the sand in his gourd, apparently concerned that this was an attack rather than a display of affection.

Fortunately, Naruto released him before the sand could come to any hasty conclusions. Gaara noticed that the shinobi’s eyes were brimming with tears and he was still breathing heavily.

“You were having a nightmare,” he tried to explain.

“No,” Naruto corrected him, “A memory...”

Naruto pulled him close again, though this time Gaara was able to return the hug. Naruto let his head drop onto Gaara’s shoulder. It was heavier than Gaara expected.

“_Please_...” Naruto whispered, and Gaara had no idea what he was asking for.

He rubbed his hands up and down Naruto’s back, in a way he hoped would be soothing. He was not sure he had comforted anyone, ever, but he had seen a scenario like this before. As Kazekage, he sometimes went to the hospitals in Suna to visit with the sick and injured. Especially after particularly rough missions, some shinobi were subject to the same kinds of flashbacks—memories that seized them from the present moment and spirited their bodies through the same feelings from the horrors they had originally endured. He tried to think of how the medical ninja had handled the situation and what they had told him to do.

He continued moving his hands slowly up and down Naruto’s back in long rhythmic sweeps.

“I’m here, Naruto. I’m okay...I’m safe...”

The tension did not leave his lover’s body. Naruto continued to struggle to catch his breath, and Gaara began to feel wetness seeping into the sleeve of his shoulder. His own stomach hardened as he struggled to think of how he could help. He was all too familiar with inner pain, and it hurt him to feel so powerless to ease Naruto’s. It hurt even more to think that the memory that Naruto was reliving right now was entirely because of him.

“Sakura-chan said...there was nothing she could do...”

Gaara traced along the scars that were scattered about Naruto’s back. He smoothed his fingers over the lean muscles and swept random patterns across the skin. He desperately wished there was something more he could do.

“If she were here right now, she’d see me alive and well. She’d see me holding the one I love in my arms. She’d see the lovely flowers he brought me yesterday and—”

A memory surfaced. It was a technique that one of the medical ninja had used to calm someone down and bring them back into the present moment. He had asked the patient to describe things around the room, what he saw, heard, felt, smelled. He tried to engage her senses to get her out of her head.

“Do you see them, Naruto? What color are they?”

Naruto’s head shifted on his shoulder, and after a few moments of snuffling, Naruto answered. “Blue...blue and purple and white...”

Gaara took one of Naruto’s hands and placed it on his neck, making sure his fingers jabbed into his neck over his carotid artery.

“That’s my pulse. Can you feel it?”

Naruto didn’t response this time, but his breaths became deeper.

Gaara tried to think of what else to do. He counted his own pulse rate silently, his mind racing to find some kind of solution, as he continued to hold on to Naruto. He lost count three times before Naruto pulled back.

Wiping his nose on the back of his hand, Naruto gave a weak smile.

“Ah, sorry. I don’t know what that was. It hasn’t been that bad in a long time...”

He scratched the back of his head, seemingly embarrassed. Even though the memory had passed, Gaara could still feel Naruto’s elevated levels of chakra. His body was still tight, and his breathing had not yet returned to normal. Everything about him was still ready to fight.

Gaara put his hand on Naruto’s cheek, but those blue eyes would not meet his. The feelings were sticking with him. He needed a distraction.

“It’s alright,” Gaara said, and not wanting to dwell on things, he continued, “Let’s have breakfast.”

Surprisingly, Naruto declined.

“I think...I think I need to go train for a bit.” His eyes finally met Gaara’s, though fleetingly. “Wanna come?”

Gaara nodded.

~~

They made their way to a clearing of trees a few miles to the north of the village, so that their training would not interrupt anyone on their way to the shrine. Gaara had an unpleasant feeling in his stomach. He did not think that it was a good idea for him and Naruto to spar. He did not want Naruto to react badly if he got hurt, and the last time he had fought with Naruto he’d still had Shukaku.

On the other hand, Gaara knew he had little ability to understand others’ emotions. If Naruto thought that this would help him feel better, then maybe it would. However, that didn’t mean that they could go at it with no holds barred.

“Don’t go all out,” Gaara stated plainly, “Remember, I don’t have Shukaku anymore. I have a lot less chakra than you remember.”

In fact, Gaara was not sure how long he could hold his own against Naruto. The Leaf shinobi had an enormous amount of chakra, and his primary mode of attack was close-range brute force. He would never tire before Gaara, and he wouldn’t stay at a distance—which was how Gaara operated best.

Though Gaara had worked on his taijutsu a lot since the last chuunin exams, and he had improved significantly; realistically, he knew he was no match for Naruto. His best bet would be to use some kind of strategy to trap Naruto into submission before his endurance ran out.

Naruto was already bouncing on the balls of his feet, ready to go. He stuck his tongue out at Gaara. “Don’t underestimate yourself, Kazekage-_chama_. Because I _won’t_.”

With that, Naruto was already at him, tossing punches and pressing him back. He was faster than Gaara remembered, though he was able to dodge most of the hits. His sand deflected the others.

When he saw an opening, he went for it, shoving his shoulder into Naruto’s chest and attempting to sweep his legs. Naruto jumped back, right into the waiting grasp of sand that sprang up from the ground. In a puff of smoke, Naruto’s clone disappeared, and Gaara whirled around to meet his attacker that was coming at him from behind.

A wave of sand shot out to push Naruto back, but he maneuvered around it like he was vaulting over a fallen log. In no time, they were face to face again, trading blows and sweat.

Gaara knew he had to get out of Naruto’s range. If he couldn’t keep Naruto back, he would have to move himself. The next time he ducked one of Naruto’s swings, he tucked and rolled forward, past the orange-clad ninja. Sand swelled under him, hastening his motion as he put distance between them. Before Naruto had time to turn around and react, Gaara was up again, hurling waves of sand.

Shadow clones popped up, deflecting the sand and charging forward. No matter how many projectiles of sand he sent their way, more and more popped up, leaping over each other’s backs and flinging each other past walls of sand.

Gaara grabbed one Naruto by the collar, pulled him close, and sent his fist through smoke. More clones came upon him, and he thrust more sand radially, targeting everyone because he couldn’t tell which was the real Naruto. They pushed him out of the clearing and into the trees again. The sheer number of clones was overwhelming him, but it would be harder for them to maneuver inside the forest.

A ball of clones tackled him, and they rolled further back into the forest, clones disappearing as they struck stones and shrubs and other obstacles. Gaara was left with who he assumed to be the real Naruto on top of him.

Gaara wrapped his legs around the ninja, trapping him. Naruto struggled to push himself up off his forearms, but Gaara grabbed Naruto’s head, pulled him forward and kissed him.

He didn’t know why he’d done it, but the change in tone was instant. Their match was effectively over, but Naruto kissed him back with an intensity like his life depended on it.

A shiver rolled through Gaara’s body as he opened his mouth for the shinobi on top of him. Naruto claimed him, pulling and sucking his lips, tasting his tongue. Gaara followed suit, meeting Naruto’s motions with his own, eager to devour his heat. When Naruto moved his mouth away, Gaara exhaled heavily in protest. He was silenced as soon as he felt lips find his neck.

Waves of euphoria that he’d never known pulsed through him as Naruto smeared open mouth kisses across his sensitive flesh. All of the hair on his body was standing on end. He felt like he was standing on the edge of a cliff after a long hike, dizzy and breathless but eager to take everything in.

Naruto got to his ear, his lips searing across the helix before fastening to Gaara’s earlobe. The soft wet sounds along with the gentle brushing of his mouth made Gaara very aware of the hardness in his pants. Without thinking, he pushed his hips into Naruto, noticing that Naruto was equally aroused.

Pieces of the talk he’d had with Temari and Kankuro filtered, unwanted, into his mind. Were they about to have sex? Should he stop and ask for Naruto’s consent? Did this count? Was it really practical to be doing it out in the open like this?

It was difficult to answer any of these questions when Gaara could only focus on how amazing and shivery Naruto was making him feel. All Gaara knew was that he felt damn good and he never wanted to let go.

Chills went through Gaara’s body, hot from Naruto’s attention and cold where damp skin met air. Even just the sounds of his breathing so close to Gaara’s ear was driving him crazy. When Naruto gently introduced teeth at his neck, he gasped and his hips arched, seeking friction.

Naruto removed his mouth, and Gaara’s whole body strained against the lack of connection. He locked eyes with the shinobi on top of him and noticed that Naruto was giving him some kind of self-conscious grin.

“Does that feel good?” he asked, genuinely shy.

Even the sound of his voice made Gaara’s blood pulse.

“Good,” Gaara repeated, unable and unwilling to put any effort into talking when they could be kissing, “More...”

He took a fist full of Naruto’s collar and pulled him in so they were kissing again. Relief and lust flooded his senses as their lips moved together once more. He wanted to be closer, always closer. He wanted to feel more of Naruto’s bare skin against his, to taste need on his tongue.

As Naruto had done, Gaara nuzzled into his neck. He could feel Naruto’s pulse as he dragged his tongue under his jaw. A sigh escaped Naruto’s lips, encouraging Gaara to keep going. He unzipped Naruto’s jacket, nudging the collar back with his face so he could taste the skin at Naruto’s collar. There was so much more of Naruto left to explore, the thought of which made Gaara ache.

Naruto pulled away again, much to Gaara’s displeasure. His face was wholly red, his mouth slightly open as he took shallow stuttering breaths.

“Hah...ah, Gaara,” Naruto panted, “It’s not...it’s not that I wanna stop, but...I don’t wanna end up like that couple we…interrupted...”

Gaara knew he was not in his right mind when the thought occurred to him that he couldn’t care less if anyone saw them. He’d never felt this height of pleasure before, and if he could just get a little closer to that edge…

But he stopped himself and his weirdly traitorous wanton body. If Naruto was uncomfortable continuing, for any reason, then of course this should end. Even without the speech his siblings had given him, Gaara would never want to ignore the feelings of his lover.

Gaara let his head fall back onto the soft earth beneath him, and he took a deep breath. His hardness throbbed in his pants. He could still feel Naruto’s against him.

“I mean, I don’t even know if that’s...if that’s where this was going...” Naruto continued.

“I don’t know,” Gaara admitted, cool logic slowly seeping back into his head. He didn’t know how to explain how his body had just taken over. He didn’t know how far he would have wanted to go. “But, you’re right. There are more appropriate, private places for such activities.”

Naruto got up, then helped Gaara up. As if on cue, his stomach growled.

“So, breakfast?” Naruto asked, a nervous edge to his voice. But he was smiling, and that made Gaara smile too.

“Surely it’s well past breakfast time now,” he replied, “Anyway, we should take our time heading back so our erections can subside.”

Naruto’s eyes doubled in size, and he looked around wildly, as if afraid there were anyone that could overhear.

“W-what? You knew?!”

Gaara looked down at Naruto’s pants. It wasn’t so obvious if he didn’t know to look for it, but it had been against his body…

“I felt it. Could you not feel mine?”

Naruto rubbed his face, clearly embarrassed. “Well, yeah, but I didn’t think that meant that you could feel mine too! Is it that obvious?”

Naruto was pacing now, mumbling to himself, completely flustered. “...and yesterday too…?”

Gaara found himself laughing a little. He wasn’t sure why Naruto was so embarrassed over something neither of them had control over. Out of all of the things he’d learned about sex, the mechanics of it seemed to be the most straightforward.

Naruto pointed at him accusingly. “You! I didn’t—” And you—!”

Gaara nudged his hand against Naruto’s, offering him to take it. He did, but his blushing and his rambling continued.

“You don’t need to be embarrassed. It’s just biological processes,” Gaara said.

“Biological processes!” Naruto shouted, incredulous. “Sure! I guess that’s one way to put it!”

“Well, biological as in physiological and emotional. And they’re all kind of influenced by each other, so technically—”

“Gaara,” Naruto said, interrupting. The blond smiled in spite of himself, then shook his head. “Ah, jeez...”

Gaara felt Naruto squeeze his hand, communicating whatever he was unable to say in his frazzled state.

Gaara smiled. “You’re cute. Anyway, let’s go eat.”

He began walking, and Naruto nearly tripped to keep up. “Gaara!”

~~

After lunch, Naruto went back to his room to get his bag. There was no point in keeping it in his assigned room, since he hadn’t stayed there one night since arriving. This way, Naruto could finally sleep in the pajamas he had packed, although Gaara preferred that he didn’t.

All of these new intrusive thoughts and feelings about wanting Naruto were slightly unsettling. This was different than the admiration he’d held for the Leaf shinobi since they’d met. It was separate from how he found Naruto handsome, and it was even apart from his feelings of generally wanting to be around him. It was like, after they had first kissed, a switch had flipped inside Gaara, and now all these intense cravings would not leave him alone.

He decided to talk to Temari about it, since she seemed willing to help him with this sort of thing.

He knocked on her door, and after hearing her calling that the door was open, he entered. Temari was sitting at a small table in front of a window. On the table was a shogi board, with pieces indicating that a game was in progress.

Shikamaru sat across from her. He briefly looked up from the board to greet Gaara. “Yo.”

Gaara nodded in acknowledgment, and took a seat by the window, slightly away from where the table was. He turned his attention to Temari, who was looking at him quizzically.

“Hey, Gaara, what’s up?”

Gaara got straight to the point. “I have a question about Naruto.”

Temari’s face froze, and her eyes darted to Shikamaru. He seemed equally as stunned.

“Remember that conversation we had about consent the other day? I’ve been wondering—”

“Oh—okay, Gaara!” Temari interrupted loudly, once again looking fiercely over her shoulder at Shikamaru.

Shikamaru coughed behind her, apparently choking on air. He got up quickly.

“I just remembered I have to go do something,” he spluttered, “See you guys later.”

After the door shut behind him, Temari sighed.

“Gaara, you just can’t...you can’t talk about those things around just anyone...” she explained, her eyes closed and her eyebrows drawn together. She rubbed at her temple before looking at him again.

Gaara ignored her. “I wanted to know if my feelings are normal. We kissed, and now...now I can’t stop thinking about him...”

A hint of surprise crossed Temari’s expression, but then she smiled at him. “Yeah, that’s perfectly normal.”

Gaara looked at her, then around the room. He didn’t quite feel embarrassment, but the next part was hard for him to ask. “Is it too early to want to have sex with him?”

Temari slapped her hand over her face.

“We _didn’t_,” Gaara clarified, “I just don’t understand all of these emotions I have now. I don’t know what to do about them.”

Temari rubbed her face, rearranging her expression into one of relief. She sighed heavily. “It’s normal to have those kinds of feelings,” she said slowly. Each of her words seemed deliberately and cautiously chosen. “You have to keep in mind that Naruto has his own feelings. There’s no standard pace to a relationship between two people. Only you two can decide how to go about your relationship.

“Remember that just because you have certain feelings, doesn’t mean you have to act on them. Sometimes you shouldn’t act on them, depending on the situation. That goes for any emotion, really…

“I can’t tell you what you should do, but I can give you advice. When we talked about this two days ago, you said that you and Naruto hadn’t done anything. Given that this is all new to you, I think you should take things slow. Feelings...emotions...they’re weird, which you already know. But now, you’re not just dealing with your own, you have to think about Naruto’s too.

“The easiest way to resolve this is to talk to him about it. If you’re both on the same page, then you’ll have a more clear understanding.”

She paused, letting her words sink in for a moment. Then she got up. “Do you want some tea?”

Gaara nodded, and soon she had returned with two steaming cups. She handed him one and took a seat next to him.

“You also need to think about what happens once this festival is over. After today, there are only two days left. I don’t think...”

She trailed off, her eyes unfocusing. She blew on her tea, took a sip, and then cleared her throat.

“I don’t think that the relationship between you is solely one of physical attraction, which means, when he goes back to Konoha and we go back to Suna...”

“It will hurt,” Gaara finished for her.

Gaara did not want to think about it. It wasn’t that the thought had not occurred to him before, but until yesterday, such a worry was just hypothetical.

Temari inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly. A faint coloring rose to her cheeks. “It’s not impossible to make things work...To have a long distance relationship. But it’s not easy. Suna is a three day journey from Konoha, and that’s going at top speed.

“And, you know, you’re the Kazekage. You’re going to be spending most of your time inside Suna...”

_And if Naruto becomes Hokage_, Gaara thought, _he would be just as trapped in Konoha_.

“It’s probably more of a priority that you and Naruto talk about that. About what happens after all of this,” Temari concluded.

Gaara stared at the teacup in his hands for a long time. He wished he could find all the answers to his questions by simply drinking all of his tea and reading the arrangement of tea leaves at the bottom of his cup.

“It’s okay to feel like you don’t know what to do,” Temari offered gently, “Naruto probably feels that way too. I think most couples feel that way when they’re just starting out. You learn to stumble through it together.”

Gaara watched the steam curl and rise from his tea, eventually disappearing. He had a lot to think about in the next two days. A lot to talk about with Naruto, too, although thinking about discussing the end of the festival and parting ways was undesirable. Gaara let his thoughts drift away from him like the steam, leaving his mind blank. It was times like this when he was glad Shukaku was gone.

~~

In the evening, everyone gathered in the village for the Lantern Drifting Ceremony. Naruto and Gaara both wore the same yukata that they had on the first day of the festival, and they waited in line to receive their lanterns. Each lantern was made of wood and rice paper and came with a small candle to place inside. The premise was to light the candle and set the lantern floating down the river, which symbolized the give and take of life. In letting go of the lantern, its light was to guide new hopes and goals through the caster’s future.

The number of lanterns floating down the river mirrored the stars dotting the night sky. Light from the candles pitched a warm glow on the people standing on the riverbank. As Gaara watched Naruto light his candle, his heart lurched. The scene in front of him was beautiful, Naruto in a dark blue yukata, with a soft radiance from the lantern highlighting his face. The backdrop of the dark water lazily carrying lanterns was behind him, and above that began a slice of the starry sky. It was picture perfect.

Naruto made his way into the water, pulling up the bottom of his yukata so as not to get it wet. Without disturbing other lanterns that people had released upstream, he gently placed his lantern in the water and watched as it drifted away. He turned and made his way back onto the shore next to Gaara, where he clapped twice, bowed, and then clapped twice more and paused to imbue some intention or prayer on his lantern.

Gaara wondered if it was similar to the hopes and wishes he’d set upon his own lantern earlier.

They made their way back up the banks, where several groups were lighting sparklers. Naruto quickly found his teammates, along with Team 10, and to Gaara’s surprise, his siblings. Naruto seemed hesitant around the Sand ninja until Kankuro clapped him on the back and handed him a sparkler. The two then started an animated discussion while waving the burning sparklers in various shapes and laughing.

Gaara was content to hang back and observe. In the back of his mind, he was burdened by thoughts of the festival ending soon—of leaving. He didn’t plan on bringing it up tonight, but it concerned him nonetheless. If they could just have this one more carefree night, maybe it wouldn’t be so hard. Maybe the memories could staunch the inevitable pain that would come on the morning of the eighth day.

Lost in his own head, Gaara hardly noticed when the pink-haired girl, Haruno Sakura approached him. She offered him a sparkler, which he accepted. As he held it, little sparks landed on his hand and wrist, though he couldn’t feel them through his sand armor.

Sakura smiled at him. “So, Naruto is staying with you now, huh?”

Gaara knew that this girl was one of Naruto’s original teammates. She had known him the longest and been by his side through countless battles. It was only logical that she would be protective of her teammate. Gaara wondered if he was about to receive some kind of stern warning.

He nodded in acknowledgment, not taking his eyes of the glow burning down the stick in his hand. It was pretty, but it burned out so fast.

“He’s kind of a big idiot sometimes—most of the time, actually, so please don’t mind that,” she said, with a hint of humor in her voice, “He’s messy and always late and tactless. Stubborn. _Immature_.”

She laughed and glanced over at Naruto, who was spinning in circles with Choji and Ino, making a halo of light surrounding them.

“But he can be sweet. He’s loyal to a fault. And he never gives up.” She paused, and turned back to Gaara. “And...you make him happy. So I guess what I’m trying to say is...please, take care of our Naruto.”

Gaara felt his face heating up. Strangely embarrassed and tongue-tied, he nodded. It was hard for him to process that Sakura had just given them her blessing.

Apparently noticing that she had taken him off-guard, Sakura dipped her head, and then returned to the group of energetic Leaf ninja. The words she had left him with gave him the urge to sit down.

He found a spot next to Temari and Shikamaru. Temari was holding a sparkler, with her knees pulled up to her chest and her chin in her free hand. Shikamaru was lying on his back, staring up at the sky. They were chatting idly and were undisturbed as Gaara joined them.

“Having fun?” Temari asked him.

“It’s nice,” Gaara replied.

“A lot nicer than those damn fireworks yesterday” Shikamaru piped up, “So loud and obnoxious.”

Temari laughed. “You sound like a grumpy old man.”

“I’m in training,” Shikamaru confirmed dryly. He rolled to his side so that he was facing Temari and Gaara and propped his head up with his hand.

“Speaking of loud an obnoxious, I guess I should congratulate you and Naruto,” Shikamaru said, directing his words to Gaara, “He’s a pain in the ass, but I guess a lovable pain in the ass. Go easy on him.”

Gaara felt a blush rise to his face again. He still did not know what to say. He had not been expecting any of the Leaf ninja to comment on his relationship with Naruto. Especially not to his face, in a positive manner.

“Thanks,” he mumbled.

Shikamaru rolled on his back again, and he and Temari resumed whatever conversation they had been in the middle of previously. Something about how overpriced the dango vendors in this village were.

Across the way, Naruto was still joking around with his friends. He and his other teammate Sai were tossing sparklers back and forth between each other, while Kankuro stood by shaking his head. Sakura and Ino were tracing various shapes of light at each other. Choji was sitting by, collecting all the burnt out sparklers and eating chips. Watching them, an odd sense of calm washed over Gaara.

Naruto caught him staring and beckoned him over. Kankuro and Sai noticed and followed suit.

“C’mon, Gaara,” Kankuro called.

_One last carefree night at a festival that only occurs once a century_, Gaara thought to himself, getting up to join them. He was going to make it count.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Every time Naruto and Gaara interact in canon, I'm like, it's just so obvious they're in love??
> 
> Also there's only two more chapters after this, and I'm kind of sad about it because I had a lot of fun writing this and I still have a lot of feelings about them.


	6. Chapter 6

“We’re going to be late for the taiko...”

Naruto moaned and rolled over. It wasn’t that he felt particularly tired (in fact, he was astonishingly well-rested!) but he also felt pretty comfortable. Plus, Gaara was here. Really, there was no incentive for him to move.

“Are you sick? Should I get Sakura-san?”

_Sakura-chan will kick my ass if I miss another ceremony..._

Naruto bolted upright, into a face full of sand. Gaara had been leaning over him, and his sand shield had activated at Naruto’s sudden movement.

Despite his desire to avoid injury, it appeared that fate wasn’t giving him a choice this morning. He spit sand and blood out of his mouth and rubbed his fingers across his split lip.

“Damn it,” he mumbled.

Gaara stood there, stock still, with shock on his face. When he seemed to process what had happened, he knelt down, lifting Naruto’s chin with his fingers and inspecting his bloodied lips.

“Are you okay? I don’t control it...it’s unconscious...” Gaara said, his voice tinted with worry. Clumps of sand buzzed in the air around him, filing back to his gourd like remorseful bees.

Naruto looked up at him and smiled, which hurt, _ow_, so he stopped doing that. He pressed his sleeve to his mouth, applying pressure to stop the bleeding.

“It’s fine,” Naruto tried to say through his sleeve.

Gaara got up and rummaged around in his things before coming back with a small jar of some kind of healing salve. He brushed Naruto’s hand aside from his mouth, and opened the lid on the jar.

“Seriously, it’s okay. I heal pretty fast,” Naruto began to say.

Gaara ignored him. He dipped his finger in the jar and then smeared some of the salve across Naruto’s lip. The smell wasn’t too bad, but it was extremely bitter.

In an attempt to lighten the mood, Naruto decided to crack a joke. “Well, at least this is a better way to wake up then yesterday!”

Gaara just stared at him, deadpan. His eyes held disbelief. After a long look, he shook his head and sighed, getting up to put away his salve.

“How can you say that? You need to be more careful,” Gaara muttered, though he didn’t really appear to be saying it to Naruto, “So reckless. It’s important to stay healthy in mind and body.”

Naruto smiled (not too widely), feeling sheepish. He got up and pulled his clothes for the day out of his bag (which conveniently was _finally_ located in Gaara’s room. Honestly, he should have brought in it here _days_ ago).

He went to make his way to the washroom when Gaara caught him by the wrist and stopped him.

“Are you okay?”” Gaara asked again, his voice more grave this time.

Naruto cocked his head to the side, nonplussed. “Yeah, sure. It’s really nothing. See? It’s almost gone already.”

Gaara looked down at where his hand grabbed Naruto.

“I meant...did you have any nightmares?”

“Oh...ah, that,” Naruto said. He shifted his heap of clothes into one hand and rubbed at his face. “I didn’t. They’re not that common. I mean, like the week after it happened was pretty bad, but they got less and less. Every now and then I get one, but...ah, don’t worry about it!”

Truthfully, Naruto didn’t want to dwell on the subject. For one, he felt embarrassed to be so affected by a dream. Second, if he spent too long thinking about the dream and what caused it, he might get dragged back into the memory again. It wasn’t something he wanted to relive, ever, let alone two days in a row.

Gaara seemed to sense Naruto’s reluctance. He let him go, but then stepped closer and kissed him on the cheek.

Naruto blushed and nearly dropped his pile of clothes.

“Alright, just don’t hurt yourself in the washroom,” Gaara quipped. He turned and headed for the kitchenette, ostensibly to eat breakfast.

Naruto stuck his tongue out after him, but then laughed. He went to get ready, his heart still knocking on the inside of his chest.

_Hell of a way to wake up._

~~

Like the dance performance on the second day of the festival, the Kazekage had a reserved seat in some kind of private section for rich important people. Naruto figured he wouldn’t be allowed in, but Gaara had insisted on bringing him along.

Most of the people in the section were incredibly old. Naruto half expected someone to object to his presence, but for the most part, everyone ignored him and spoke with Gaara instead.

Watching Gaara converse with one particularly ancient woman, Naruto found himself beginning to wonder if the wrinkly and saggy skin on the woman’s face was obscuring her vision. He remembered a time at the academy when he’d had a teacher similarly old and wrinkly, yet never failed to notice when he’d started daydreaming. He could still remember how his lungs burned from the cloud of chalk dust that surrounded him after she’d beamed him in the head with an eraser...

Someone tapped him on the shoulder, and he whirled around, fighting hard at the urge to react defensively.

It was a woman who looked kind of familiar, but Naruto couldn’t quite recall how he might know her. _Well, at least she’s not Tsunade-baachan. Something tells me she wouldn’t take too kindly to seeing me in this super private important people section…_

When Naruto didn’t say anything, the woman seemed to realize that he had failed to recognize her. She laughed, covering her mouth as she did so.

“Fujikaze Yukie,” she said simply, stating her own name.

Naruto narrowed his eyes, searching his memory for the name. After a painful ten seconds, he was still drawing a blank.

“Kazahana Koyuki, from the Land of Snow,” she added finally, her smile slipping.

_Land of Snow…_

“Oh! You’re the princess actress lady!” Naruto exclaimed, finally remembering.

At his side, Gaara had hurriedly ended his conversation with the old woman and was looking at Naruto with some concern.

Koyuki rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah. Glad to see you’re still a fan,” she remarked dryly.

Naruto laughed and rubbed the back of his head, embarrassed. “It’s been a long time...”

Gaara said nothing, just continued to observe the odd exchange. Naruto wondered if he should introduce the two.

“It really has. Well, if you’re in this section, that must mean you’ve become Hokage after all,” Koyuki said, her face relaxing back into an easy smile, “Congratulations.”

Naruto laughed nervously and blushed. “No...No, actually, I’m here with...”

He gestured vaguely to Gaara.

“With the Kazekage...”

Koyuki turned her attention to Gaara, her eyes widening in surprise.

“Oh! Kazekage-sama. I didn’t realize...Nice to meet you.” She bowed deeply, her back parallel with the floor.

Gaara’s face remained indifferent. “Fujikaze Yukie. I think my brother is a fan of your movies.”

Koyuki straightened up, but kept her eyes cast down.

“Thank you,” she said softly, her voice uncharacteristically subdued.

Naruto had not known this woman to be shy. It really had been a long time after all. And she’d mistaken him for the Hokage! Had he changed that much too? He knew for sure that when he’d first met her, she’d thought of him as a snot-nosed brat.

Naruto decided he must be pretty cool now, for her to have assumed that he was the leader of the Leaf Village. He puffed out his chest and interrupted the pleasantries she was exchanging with Gaara.

“If you ever need a bodyguard again, I guess I wouldn’t mind,” Naruto preened.

Koyuki looked from Gaara to Naruto, then back to Gaara.

“I wouldn’t want to interrupt your duty to Lord Kazekage,” she replied.

Naruto heard Gaara snort.

_Duty to Lord Kazekage…?_

“I’m not his bodyguard!” Naruto protested, his bravado leaving as quickly as it came.

He hated how whiny he sounded, but he didn’t want to be misconstrued as Gaara’s bodyguard (not that he would mind being a bodyguard for Gaara—although as a Leaf ninja, it wouldn’t make sense for him to do that anyway, not that she would know, being a civilian and all—but still! It wasn’t like it was job to be around Gaara, and the idea that he was only there on some kind of assignment was irksome). Even Naruto realized that he and Gaara couldn’t be public about the true nature of their relationship (due to various political bullshit), but that didn’t mean anyone could devalue their friendship either! They’d been friends long before this festival, they were still friends, and hopefully they’d remain friends for a long time to come…

“I see,” Koyuki said slowly. She cast a strange look at Gaara, one that Naruto didn’t understand. “Well, the show will be starting soon. I should sit down now. It was nice seeing you, Naruto. Lord Kazekage.”

She bowed and hurried away.

Naruto furrowed his brows and turned to Gaara, who seemed amused.

“What was that about?” he mumbled.

Gaara took a shallow breath, like he was about to say something. At a closer look, there seemed to be a faint pink dusting across the Kazekage’s nose and cheeks. Then, Gaara closed his mouth, apparently deciding against whatever he had been about to say.

He turned towards the stage. “We should take our seats too.”

Naruto followed Gaara down the aisle to the row where Gaara was assigned. Temari and Kankuro were already there, along with some other probably important Sand ninja. Upon seeing Naruto, Temari’s jaw dropped. Kankuro looked uneasy.

Naruto noticed that there wasn’t an available seat for him, and he shifted on his feet nervously, standing by the end of the row.

Temari got up suddenly, elbowing Kankuro in the back of the head on her way out of the row. She went up to Gaara and whispered something to him.

“We’ll be right back,” she said for everyone to hear, as she led Gaara a short distance away, out of earshot.

Judging by the tone of her voice, Naruto didn’t think he should follow. He was contemplating the options of sitting on the ground or going back to the section where his friends and teammates would be. He didn’t want to ditch Gaara, but if there wasn’t an extra seat…

Kankuro stood abruptly.

“I just remembered I have to do something right now. It’s an emergency. Take my seat, Naruto. I won’t be back.” For someone actually rushing off to some crisis, Kankuro’s voice sounded oddly robotic.

Before Naruto could respond, Kankuro had already brushed past him and started up the aisle.

The lights dimmed, and the noise of the crowd began to hush. Not wanting to block the view of any aristocrat and embarrass the Leaf Village forever, Naruto quickly took Kankuro’s seat.

Confusion settled over him. _What the hell was with everyone today?_ Naruto was no social scientist, but he was pretty sure that Koyuki, Temari, and Kankuro were all on the same page of an entirely different chapter.

As the performers took the stage and began drumming, Gaara and Temari returned to their seats.

Naruto turned to Gaara, seeking some kind of explanation. Gaara kept his gaze fixed forward.

~~

Gaara was curt when the performance was over. He explained that he had to attend a ceremony at the shrine with all of the other Kage, which involved blessing infants. He didn’t know how long it would take, and he didn’t stick around to hash out any plans with Naruto for later.

Naruto was left feeling a little annoyed. Obviously he would have to go back to Gaara’s room at some point—his stuff was in there! It seemed like maybe Temari had said something that upset Gaara, and Naruto didn’t like how closed off he was being about it. After they’d been so vulnerable with each other, it didn’t make sense for Gaara to be distant.

In an attempt to stop hanging around Gaara’s inn, Naruto made himself run laps around the village. He didn’t want to talk to his friends about it—and maybe that was hypocritical of him—but he didn’t want them questioning what was between him and Gaara.

At the lantern floating festival last night, they’d been so...couple-y. Not overtly, of course—ninja did not do public displays of affection, they were not lovey-dovey, it just wasn’t done. But there were obvious signs...the way that Asuma-sensei and Kurenai-sensei were obviously together. Nobody had to say it outright, and it’s not like they made a big spectacle of their relationship. It was just quietly understood. No one had been all that surprised when Kurenai revealed her pregnancy. No one had to ask who the father was.

For once, Naruto wanted that kind of quiet understanding and acceptance directed towards an aspect of his life. From the outside, Naruto knew what it looked like. Gaara was the Kazekage, and he was just a Leaf genin. Their villages were days apart. They were the jinchuuriki of their respective villages. No one had taught them how to be in a relationship. Deep down, Naruto was insecure.

The physical exertion from running helped. He bolted through the trees, tearing leaves from boughs with his sheer speed. Moving around and being active had helped him relax since his earliest memories from before starting the academy. It was only when he was sitting around idle when his thoughts could catch up with him.

_Gaara’s lifeless body hung limp in his arms--_

Naruto pushed himself harder._ Not that. Anything but that._

“_Sakura—please!”_

His eyes stung, and he clenched his jaw as he put his head down and ran even faster. He felt like he was going to choke. Tears streaked across his face. His legs began to feel wobbly.

“_He’s...he’s gone, Naruto. There’s no jutsu to bring back the dead.”_

Naruto felt something stir inside his belly, and a familiar surge of chakra flooded through him. _Kyuubi. _He looked at his hands to see that they had become more claw-like. He bit his lip and drew blood with his newly sharpened fangs.

He had to calm down before he lost control. He had to tire himself out more. Still running, he wove the signs to create shadow clones. They ran alongside him, each spending some of his chakra and energy.

A familiar flash of green broke their formation.

“Hiya, Naruto-kun!” Rock Lee called, sprinting up beside Naruto like it required no effort at all.

Naruto wondered how bizarre he must look right now—out in the middle of the forest, midday during a festival, running at full force with a hoard of shadow clones and decked out in chakra from the Nine-Tails. If Lee noticed, he didn’t mention it. Then again, Lee was someone who believed in always training at the maximum level, so maybe he didn’t find Naruto’s situation odd.

“I have been going a little stir crazy these past couple days,” Lee admitted, “Of course I have been training every day, but not nearly as often as I would like! I cannot let my body grow weak!”

It was unimaginable that Lee would ever resemble anything close to weak. Naruto could easily picture the green shinobi at ninety years old, karate chopping trees and outrunning jounin on their morning routines.

Naruto grunted in agreement, though he was fully aware that he’d been shirking his training most of the week. He’d sparred with Gaara to clear his head, and now he was running for the same reason. Come to think of it, Naruto began to wonder if Lee would spar with him as well.

Lee was fast and a physical powerhouse. He stood a good chance of kicking the crap out of Naruto, provided that he suppressed the Kyuubi, and maybe that was what Naruto needed right now. At the very least, it would take his mind off things.

“Hey, you wanna spar?” Naruto shouted against the wind howling past them as they ran.

Lee smiled and gave him a thumbs up.

~~

By the time they were done, Naruto was beat (figuratively and physically). He made his way back to the inn, not caring whether or not Gaara had returned. He didn’t have the key to the room, but he figured he could climb in through the window if necessary. He hoped there weren’t any Sand ANBU guarding the Kazekage’s room, but even if that were the case, they would have already known that he was staying there—so they shouldn’t bother him.

He tried the door first, and to his surprise, it was open. Gaara wasn’t inside, Naruto did not feel his chakra signature, but Temari was.

Sighing, Naruto entered the room anyway. If she wanted to slice him to bits, he’d rather get it over with. He didn’t really think she had anything against him—she’d been nice to him at the Lantern Drifting last night, and pretty much every other time he’d seen her at the festival, but whatever she told Gaara this morning was probably about them. And Gaara had been very brusque afterwards.

“Hey, Temari. I was just gonna take a bath and then pass out,” Naruto said, his voice belaying his exhaustion.

She looked him up and down, and he knew he was a mess. Scratched up, sweaty, dirty, clothes dotted with blood, skin just starting to show bruises. He’d gone hard, and so had Lee.

“Training?” she asked.

He nodded and continued on his way to the washroom. She called out after him, in a tone of voice that made him stop.

“Naruto?”

He waited.

“If you have a minute...after your bath...I wanted to talk to you about something.”

Naruto stifled a yawn. “You got it, Temari-neechan.”

~~

The bath only served to make Naruto even more tired. All of his limbs felt like boiled noodles. He pulled on his pajamas and went out to the main room, slightly hoping that Temari had left.

She hadn’t, and Naruto sat on the floor next to the bedroll. If he sat on it, he knew it would only be a matter of time before he fell asleep. He wanted to make it through at least a quarter of this conversation before that happened.

Then he could wake up and Gaara would be there, snuggled up next to him. Or he could wake up and Gaara would be by the window, sifting through reports with that cute focused expression he had. _He would look over and see that Naruto had woken up and smile..._

“Sorry. I know you’re tired, but there isn’t a lot of time left. Tomorrow’s the last day of the festival.”

Naruto reluctantly removed himself from his daydreaming to focus on Temari.

“I’ll get to the point. I wanted to know what your intentions are for my brother—for Gaara,” she stated. Her hands fidgeted with each other in her lap.

“I love him,” Naruto said simply.

The blankets behind him were calling to him. He wasn’t even looking at them, but he knew they were there, being so soft and warm and inviting.

Temari seemed a little at a loss for words, which Naruto found kind of silly. What had she been expecting him to say? He wasn’t someone who hid his emotions in any capacity, so it had to be obvious to her already.

“It’s...it’s a little more complicated than that,” she stammered, after a full minute of gathering her thoughts in silence.

Naruto shrugged. “I don’t think it is.”

Naruto could appreciate Temari’s concern for her brother (although he would have appreciated it more had he been less sleepy). It was proof that Gaara had put in the work to form bonds with others, the same kind of bonds he had lacked for the first twelve years of his life. Bonds that made him human. Bonds that made life worth living.

He’d really taken Naruto’s advice from all those years ago, and changed the minds of even those who feared him most. He had a whole village of people who cared about him, and that made Naruto proud.

On the other hand, Temari didn’t need to be worrying about him in this regard. Naruto wasn’t out to take advantage of the Kazekage, and he couldn’t imagine anyone would be stupid enough to try.

He thought back to the conversation he’d had with Sakura and Sai after the first night he’d spent with Gaara. She’d smacked him, assuming he’d pressured Gaara into something weird and pervy. Jeez, why did everyone have such shitty opinions about his motives? Sure, he was kind of dumb sometimes, but he wasn’t _that_ dumb.

“I would never do anything he didn’t want me to do,” Naruto said softly. He had come to the conclusion that maybe part of being in a relationship included proving that he was an upstanding individual to the people who cared about Gaara. “We’ve been working things out so far...”

Temari turned red, and quickly cut him off. “I didn’t mean it like that! When Gaara told us the other day...Kankuro and I...we were glad it was you. We never...”

She paused to breathe and settle her thoughts a little before continuing.

“We never really gave much thought to Gaara having those kinds of feelings for anyone, so that was a bit shocking. But, the fact that it’s you that he feels this way about...we’re very lucky. We know you, Naruto. You have a good heart, and we know you’ll only be good for our little brother. You’ve already had such a positive impact in his life—in all of our lives, really.”

Naruto began to protest, but she spoke over him.

“I wasn’t questioning your character, and I apologize if it came off that way. I’m concerned about...public perception. I know this might sound kind of paranoid, Kankuro already told me that, but the implications of Gaara being in a relationship...let alone with someone from another village...really could have an impact on national security.”

Naruto felt his eyes glazing over. He wasn’t sure if it was the product of his exhaustion, relief that Temari didn’t think he was a creep, or the inevitable boredom that came along with talking about foreign politics.

“This morning, for example, seemed to raise a few eyebrows,” she pressed.

Naruto yawned again. “Most people thought I was his bodyguard or something. Anyway, one day I’ll be Hokage so it won’t even matter. I’d have been there anyway...”

Somehow he had inched back to be sitting on the blankets. This was dangerous territory. Naruto was struggling on the cusp of consciousness.

Like she had said, there was only one day left of the festival. How much damage could they really do in that amount of time?

She sighed and then stood up, like she was ready to leave. Maybe she had come to terms with the fact that this discussion was a lost cause.

“Just...try to be discreet...” she said.

_We’ve been staying in the same room all week_, Naruto thought,_ I think it’s a little past that point_.

Gaara entered the room just as she was leaving, but Naruto had already fallen asleep.

~~

“So...did you bless a lot of babies?”

Naruto walked to Gaara’s side, along one of the many trails through the forest surrounding the village. The sun had set before Naruto had risen from his nap (which had lasted several hours), and the only light to guide their way came from the moon and the flickering lantern that Naruto was holding. Gaara seemed to have some idea of where he was going, and Naruto hadn’t questioned it.

His muscles had been all stiff and sore as soon as he woke up. He had gone with Gaara to get dinner, though Gaara had been oddly silent through the meal. Naruto had been busy refueling from all the calories he’d burned earlier, so there weren’t many opportunities for him to open his mouth without shoving more food in.

He’d thought that maybe they would have some kind of uncomfortable conversation after they finished eating (centered around the stuff Temari was worried about), but Gaara had surprised him by offering to take him to a well known cave located in the valleys northeast to the village. If Gaara had a reason for wanting to visit this particular cave, he didn’t share. Naruto was just happy to be spending time together. He would have gladly followed Gaara anywhere.

“I wasn’t doing the blessing, I just had to be there. You didn’t miss much, besides maybe a headache from all of the crying.”

“I missed you,” Naruto responded quickly, sending a dopey grin Gaara’s way.

Gaara stumbled but caught himself.

“Sorry, do you need more light?”

Gaara shook his head.

They were silent for a few minutes after that. The terrain was more uneven here, rocky, and cut through with streams. They crossed one at a time, careful not to slip and bash their heads against river rocks.

It really was a nice night, Naruto thought. Years ago, it was common for him to be on some kind of mission that required the same kind of unhurried walking through nature. Most of the times, it was a D level escort mission with no real threat of danger. A few contradictions stood out in his memory, principally on his mind was the mission in the Land of Snow (which probably was just because he’d seen Koyuki earlier).

It gave him an odd nostalgic feeling. He didn’t often reminisce about his past. There were too many memories that started off fine and then took a sharp turn into something he’d rather not think about.

“Temari said you were training,” Gaara said, breaking up the harmony of crickets and cicadas singing to the stars.

“Yup. Me and Bushy-brows! He said he’s been training everyday this week, and it showed. I’ve definitely been slacking...”

“He is a formidable opponent,” Gaara agreed, “Did you overdo it? Is that why you were so tired?”

Naruto laughed. “Ahh, maybe. I feel bad because when I got back, Temari-neechan was trying to talk to me about something important but I was falling asleep, and now I can’t really remember much of what she was saying...”

Gaara paused as they reached yet another section of the stream. Naruto held the lantern out, and Gaara crossed briskly. His footsteps hardly made a sound as he stepped across the surface of the water.

“It doesn’t matter. She’s worrying over trifles that are inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. If the movement of the Akatsuki continues the way it has...well, anyway...I think we both know what’s coming.” He sighed. “Sometimes it’s easier to nitpick issues you feel you might actually have some control over.”

Naruto crossed, and the pair continued walking along.

Something about Gaara dismissing Temari’s concerns did not make sense. Whatever she had said to him earlier had caused him to act differently. He’d been upset. Gaara wasn’t the type to lie about his feelings, which led Naruto to believe that maybe she’d said something different to each of them.

Like most things, Naruto decided to just be direct about it. “What happened at the taiko performance? She said something that affected you.”

Gaara didn’t answer right away. The trees thickened around them, swallowing up their conversation as well as the sound from the crickets and cicadas. The only rustling came from their steps forward. The leaves above them trapped enough moonlight that light from the lantern became essential.

They came across a steep rock wall, and Gaara followed it to the left. He still seemed to know where he was going, which was comforting. The silence and darkness was starting to get a little unnerving.

“I guess...” Gaara began, exhaling slowly, “She reminded me that there’s only one day left of this festival.”

There was hurt in Gaara’s voice, and it turned Naruto’s stomach to hear it.

“Are you worried about the Akatsuki?”

Gaara laughed. It was short and sharp and unnatural, and it didn’t help Naruto feel any better.

“Yes. That’s an ongoing thing...so constantly in the background that I’ve become numb to it. I guess that’s irresponsible of me, as Kazekage...”

Naruto stopped walking, which Gaara noticed immediately when the light stopped following him. Gaara seemed to be avoiding the point, which was frustrating. As he had said, they only had one day left! There was no time to be dragging things out.

“It’s selfish of me, but I don’t want the festival to end. When it does, we’ll go our separate ways, and that will be painful.”

Gaara turned to face Naruto. His mouth was drawn into a thin line, and his green eyes flashed in the warm lantern light. The shadows carving out his face made him seem tired and old and sad.

Naruto wanted to protest. He wanted to point out that they still had one whole day, and they ought to make the best of it! But something about the way that Gaara’s shoulders sagged, something about the hollowness in his expression, the way his footsteps were heavy as he approached, kept Naruto silent.

Less than a breath away, Gaara ghosted his fingers under Naruto’s chin, tilting his head slightly as he leaned forward. Gaara placed a kiss on Naruto’s lips as if he were stamping a wax seal on his mouth. His hand dropped away and he pulled back, an air of finality rushing in to fill his space. The familiar taste of loneliness seeped bitter across his tongue.

“After the festival is over, what does that mean for this? For us?”

Gaara’s voice was so flat, so monotone, that if Naruto didn’t know better, he might have thought Gaara was calling their newfound relationship meaningless. Even knowing otherwise did little to dispel the heaviness between them. The question hadn’t crossed Naruto’s mind before, and he had no answer prepared.

He put his hand on Gaara’s shoulder and ran his fingertips down his arm as he considered their options.

“It means something to me,” he said, pausing to chew his lip, “And I don’t see why that should change just because the festival ends. Distance won’t change how I feel about you.

“We might see each other less, yeah, but you know...we’re kind of on the brink of war. Even if we were from the same village, we’d be busy. Hell, even in peace times, a couple of ninja from the same village are always going out on different missions. Other people have done this kind of thing successfully before so...why couldn’t we? If we wanted to, we could probably do it better than all of those people combined. Yeah, because we have you and me so we’re bound to make it work great.

“So whaddya say? Because I’m willing to give it a shot.”

Gaara didn’t say anything. He came closer, and Naruto thought he was reaching for his hand, but he actually just took the lantern from him. Without any explanation, he turned and began walking again.

Naruto felt like he’d been punched in the stomach, but he stumbled along after Gaara anyway. The light of the lantern bobbed through the darkness, beckoning him forward. The radius of its glow seemed to be plucking out the more measured emotions in the sudden tempest of feelings that surrounded him. He couldn’t tell if he had said something wrong, or if Gaara had just rejected him, or if he had agreed but just didn’t feel the need to confirm it verbally.

Logically, the easiest thing to do would be to ask for clarification, but he felt that he’d already been so straightforward. Maybe Gaara just didn’t want to answer. Maybe he didn’t have an answer. _Maybe he was formulating an answer?_

Shadows tugged at his heels, but Naruto persisted forward. As unnatural as it was, he willed himself to be patient. They hadn’t changed direction, meaning that they were still on course for the cave. Gaara hadn’t simply taken off with the lantern or smashed it or something. He slowed his pace if Naruto lagged, though he didn’t look back. It seemed like his body was on autopilot.

Ignoring the rockiness in his stomach, Naruto drew closer to Gaara. They reached the mouth of the cave, and Naruto followed Gaara inside without hesitation.

Immediately past the entrance of the cavern, they were met with hundreds of transparent crystal chords, angular and sturdy enough to be the cave’s teeth. As Gaara walked through the vines of crystal, light from the lantern splintered off each edge, scattering shards of light all around them.

As they moved deeper into the cave, it became harder to walk because the growths of crystals became more dense. Eventually Gaara paused at a space where the ground was not too convoluted with stalagmites, and sand unfurled from the gourd on his back to create an even surface for sitting.

Wordlessly, Naruto joined him in the small patch of sand, neither of them daring to break the enchantment. Naruto barely breathed. The dip and sway lantern light caught every face of every glassy surface. Warm specks of light fluttered through the air like fireflies.

Naruto watched lazy stars alight on Gaara’s skin, mapping themselves to his cheeks and across his nose, then shoot away to another galaxy as more bright flecks took their place. Each slight movement as Gaara’s eyes swept around the inside of the cave sent a fresh meteor shower across his skin.

Naruto’s heart felt like a hot stone weighing down his chest and slowing his pulse. His head felt full of water. All of his attention was consumed by the celestial beauty in front of him.

Gaara’s eyes met his, and more than a gaze passed between them. Somewhere, a small boy tentatively stood up from a swing and walked across the dry cracked land to another young child. The sky above them tore open, revealing an endless sea of cosmos, swirling and twinkling, and stretching this moment to the next and back to the beginning.

All feeling left Naruto’s body, all of his senses switched off. There was only him and Gaara and the warm glow streaking back and forth between them.

A profound sense of calm soaked through him. This beautiful moment was one of the many that made all the shitty aspects of life worth it. Every struggle, every failure, every time he was left behind, doubted, or put down, every time someone had spit in his face, every friend he’d lost along the way, every promise he’d failed to keep, all of it, even together, as a collective sink of pain and anguish – none of it held any weight here.

Here he was, sitting next to the Kazekage of Sunagakure, a man who shared the same rough experience of growing up a jinchuuriki. A man who, in spite of in spite of it all, had rose above the fear and misjudgment. A man who had outgrown the expectations set for him at birth. A man who was loved and respected by an entire village – a village that once feared and reviled the mere mention of his existence. Someone who had become a friend, a close and respected friend. Someone whose life he had held in his hands. Someone who Naruto would trust to hold his own life.

However this week ended, however this festival ended, it was worth it. He and Gaara had grown closer, intimate. It was the first time that someone had looked at him in that way, had treated him with such gentle curiosity. It was the first time he had welcomed someone’s body, full of strength and brimming with passion against his own. If nothing else, he would be leaving this place behind with invaluable memories. If nothing else, he had _felt_, and he had _shared_, and he had _learned_.

In that instant, their hearts were linked. The boundaries between them unwound, and their frayed ends joined together in unison. Gaara’s thoughts and feelings came through as clear as if they were Naruto’s own, and everything simply made sense. There was no more doubt or obscurity. Naruto could see clear as day the thoughts on Gaara’s mind, and he knew that Gaara could see his as well.

Naruto could feel the deep affection that Gaara stored in his heart. For his village, his country, his people, his family, and Naruto. The feeling was strong and sturdy and stubborn. It was what Naruto thought of as love.

Naruto sighed and settled bonelessly into the sand beneath him. The grains were warm against his fingertips as he stretched his palms out. Gaara’s eyes on him were sweet and glittering. There was love between them. Even if only for a split second, it was there. Two outcasts had found it in their hearts to bond.

Naruto felt his hand gripping at the fabric of his chest, over his heart. No matter what happened after this, he was sure that everything would be alright in the end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to have Lee show up in this fic at least once because of several reasons. First, I had an embarrassingly huge crush on him when I was 13. Second, he's the reason I started watching Naruto in the first place! (The first episode I ever saw was where he was having a flashback to him training at the academy but being unable to do taijutsu but still trying his very best anyway and then Gai-sensei telling him that he could still be a great jounin if he tried his best. Awww, even now I still feel all mushy about it). Third, one of my all-time favorite Naruto fanfictions is Diplomatic Relations by Maldoror_Chant (which apparently is now on AO3! I remember reading it YEARS ago on Wordpress or something...I was probably too young to be reading that kind of content, heh...(if you do decide to check it out, it's rated E...also it's GaaLee, which I realize is kind of strange for me to be recommending here, after a chapter in a GaaNaru fic ^_^;;)). FOURTH, the very first Naruto fanfiction I ever wrote was a really silly Rock Lee / OC (aka self insert) fanfic that I wrote when I was 14 (the site that it was posted on originally is long gone). So yeah, anyway, Rock Lee will always hold a special place in my heart <3
> 
> In terms of Shippuden progress, I'm at about episode 494 now. Is it just me, or was the jump from episode 479 to 484 really jarring?
> 
> I also wanted to take this time to question my strange fascination with glowing crystal caves. This is the second fic where I've used that as a setting?? Why do I like them so much? I think it has to do with that one episode in ATLA where Aang and Katara get trapped in that Earthbender cave...
> 
> Finally (sorry for all these random comments, but eh, they're at the end so probably easy enough to skip), I was listening to the album EWBAITE a lot during the week when I was writing this chapter and that is totally where I got the last sentence of this chapter from.


	7. Chapter 7

When the two shinobi finally emerged from the cave hours later, the sun was blushing pink at the horizon. Gaara brought his hand to shield his eyes as he scanned the horizon to get his bearings. The landscape looked different in the early morning light than it had when they’d arrived in the dead of night.

“It’s the last day,” Naruto said softly, stepping out from the mouth of the cave cautiously.

Neither of them had gotten any sleep, which gave Gaara some concern – at least for the Leaf ninja. He would try to get them back to the inn as quick as possible so Naruto could rest before the big closing ceremony.

Gaara placed two fingers over his left eye and used the Sand Eye jutsu to get a better vantage point. When he had figured out the best route, he dispelled the jutsu and turned to his comrade.

“I suppose there’s no harm in being selfish today,” Gaara mused, “It’s impossible to know when we’ll have another opportunity to spend the day together.”

Naruto beamed at him, bathing him in a warmer glow than the sun’s nascent rays filtering through the trees.

“Hopefully sometime before the next hundred-year festival,” Naruto remarked. He was holding the lantern that had gone out hours ago, and it swung violently as he spoke, emphasizing each of his words.

“It will definitely be before then,” Gaara confirmed.

~~

At first, Naruto protested going to sleep. He argued that it defeated the purpose of spending time together if he was not awake to experience it. Gaara countered that technically they would still be together, and if Naruto fell asleep during the closing ceremony then Tsunade would have his head.

Naruto conceded.

Gaara probably should have been practicing for his own role in the ceremony, but he refused to move from Naruto’s side. As Kazekage, it was his job to relate to his people. In order to do that, he needed to form bonds with others, and in order to maintain those bonds, he would have to nurture them. So, in a way, making the most of their time together was more important than memorizing stage directions and lines to an old poem.

Besides, he could very well read the script with Naruto sleeping next to him. No trade-offs were required.

When Naruto woke up and insisted that he had slept enough, they went for breakfast. Coincidentally, they came across Naruto’s teammates, who joined them.

Sai mentioned that Lee had come to their room at four in the morning, asking if Naruto wanted to get a jump start on training for the day. Sai had explained to him that Naruto wasn’t there, that he was with the Kazekage.

Naruto’s face turned red. He seemed embarrassed to know he would have to explain this to Lee later.

Gaara felt amused. He doubted that the Leaf shinobi knew where the Kazekage was staying, but by some chance, if he did, he would have found their room to be empty last night.

As they were finishing up, Gaara spotted Temari and Shikamaru just walking in.

_Hypocrite_, he thought, albeit fondly. He couldn’t blame her, obviously, when he was doing the same thing. He’d never thought much about it before, but he was beginning to wonder if there could be a successful program set up between the countries whee shinobi from both villages could go on missions together…

Temari and Shikamaru joined them, both somewhat subdued. Temari cleared her throat and tried to bring up something to direct the conversation away from herself.

“Those flowers you brought were so lovely. Did you know they were the first Kazekage, Reto-sama’s, favorite?”

Next to Naruto, Sakura lit up with a huge grin. Naruto rubbed his face with his hands. “Ah, well...not exactly.”

“To be fair, I did not know that either,” Gaara stated, coming to his lover’s aid.

Naruto laughed and shot him a grateful look.

Temari just shook her head and sighed.

Sakura chimed in that she and Ino had known, and the two women began an animated conversation about botany.

“Well, I guess it’s back to work tomorrow,” Shikamaru complained.

“Hey, there’s no point in being so negative! We still have the rest of today!” Naruto refuted.

Shikamaru said nothing, but steepled his fingers in front of his face. It was clear his thoughts were well into the future, likely concerned with the inevitable confrontation with the Akatsuki.

“Really, neither of you have any reason to be whining. You’ve both had a great time at this festival as far as I can see,” Sai interjected, teasing.

Naruto immediately reddened, turned to Sai, and spluttered some very unconvincing protests. Shikamaru too had some color rise to his face, though he remained still.

Gaara found himself smiling. Naruto wasn’t someone who just wore his heart on his sleeve. He wore his heart on his face – actually, he wore it on a banner which he waved in everyone else’s faces. It was idiotic at times, but admirable.

Gaara thought about how over the past few days he’d experienced emotions intense enough to require more strength and focus than he had needed to block Shukaku from his mind. For Naruto to openly brandish his feelings all the time required an immense amount of emotional strength. Gaara could not imagine how exhausted he would be if he were even half as extroverted as Naruto.

He watched as Naruto animatedly pointed and yelled, arguing with Sai, yet at the same time being completely transparent. To experience the joys and sorrows of others, to relate to them in that way, Naruto really did that to the fullest extent.

Acknowledging this made Gaara feel warm.

“Okay, okay, enough! Shut the hell up!” Sakura finally chimed in, annoyed.

Naruto stuck his tongue out at Sai.

Sai did not seem in the least bit perturbed.

“Let’s just pay and get out of here,” Sakura huffed.

~~

Sai and Sakura slipped away eventually, and Gaara and Naruto ended up at the shrine again. Considering everyone would have to come back here in the afternoon for the closing ceremony, it was fairly deserted. There were a few shinobi getting in their last minute prayers, but most had hung back in the village to eat, drink, and shop for souvenirs.

“We should get souvenirs too,” Naruto suggested.

Gaara did not understand. “But almost everyone from our villages are already here. Who would the souvenirs be for?”

Naruto did that thing where he looked at Gaara, then away, then back at Gaara again. His hands were fidgeting, like he was practicing hand seals but forgot the correct sequence.

“I meant for us. To remember this...and for good luck!”

Gaara wasn’t so superstitious himself, but he didn’t mind the thought of having a keepsake from this week. On top of that, if the talismans actually did contain any kind of luck…

“Okay.”

They made their way to the omamori stand. There were dozens of brightly colored protective amulets, each with paper descriptions labeling the purpose of each one. A section of pink and red and blue amulets were labeled with words like “For Love” or “For Relationships,” but Gaara didn’t feel like he needed any extra luck in that area.

His eyes caught on a simple black omamori, with gold embellishments. The label under it was, “Protection from Bad Luck.” He picked up up and turned it over in his hand. If any of these charms could help Naruto ‘jump headfirst into action without a second thought’ Uzumaki, this would probably be the safest bet.

He closed his fist around it. “I found one for you.”

Naruto looked over and noticed that Gaara’s hand was covering it. He seemed to take this as a challenge. “Fine, but don’t look when I pick yours!”

Gaara obliged. He took his omamori to the shrine miko and paid for it, then waited on the other side of the stand for Naruto to make his decision.

This was their last day together. After the ceremony, each village would pack up and leave. Life would go on. If the reports he had reviewed earlier in the week were accurate, trouble was looming. Looking into the future, only uncertainty and instability seemed to remain as constants.

Occupied by his thoughts, Gaara barely registered the person who approached him. She wasn’t Naruto, and he hadn’t been expecting anyone to seek him out.

“Kazekage-sama!” she called cheerfully.

Gaara’s eyes cleared to see a young kunoichi in front of him. He’d taught her a few things before the chuunin exams that were held jointly between the Leaf and the Sand. Her name was Matsuri.

She smiled brightly at him, and behind her hid a small child clutching at her legs.

“Matsuri,” he responded, dipping his head in acknowledgment.

Matsuri bowed, then pushed the child that was hiding behind her to the forefront.

“This is my little sister, Machi,” Matsuri explained. She turned to the girl and in a chiding voice said, “Be polite and bow to Gaara-sama.”

The little girl did as she was told, and Gaara recognized her as the same child who had run into him on the first day of the festival. He had seen her on the fifth day too, and she had given him an origami crane.

“You again,” he said, a ghost of affection creeping through his voice.

Matsuri looked at the small girl with surprise. “Machi! You met Gaara-sama?!”

Machi nodded, and Matsuri turned to Gaara with an apologetic expression.

“I’m so sorry if she caused you any trouble,” she said, bowing again, deeper this time, “She still has a few years left at the academy, so I’m afraid she’s not very well-mannered...”

“No trouble at all,” Gaara replied, “She gave me a paper crane the other day, and it was very well-made.”

Matsuri laughed nervously. “Oh, no, no! It was probably clumsy. Machi, you should thank Kazekage-sama for such a compliment!”

Machi mumbled a shy ‘thank you’.

“Have you enjoyed the festival?” Gaara asked, attempting to be personable.

Matsuri nodded. “Oh yes, of course. But I am also excited to get back to my regular duties as a shinobi! My team and I have taken this chance to fully rest and recover so that we will be able to perform to the best of our abilities for Sunagakure!”

Gaara had to smile at that. He admired her dedication, and in a way, it reminded him of Naruto. He also couldn’t help but realize that three years ago, this interaction wouldn’t have happened. He’d come so far as a shinobi, as a Kazekage, but perhaps most so as a person.

“Thank you for all of your hard work,” he said.

Matsuri brought her hand to her mouth, to cover the giant grin that had broken out across her face.

“Oh, it’s nothing. I’m happy to, really.”

They spoke for a few minutes more, then she and Machi said their goodbyes. Gaara was still elated from the interaction when Naruto finally came around the corner with something cupped between both of his hands.

“There were a lot to choose from, and some of them I couldn’t read the calligraphy so I had to get the miko to tell me what they meant, and--”

“It’s fine,” Gaara interrupted.

Naruto blinked. Then, his eyes closed, and he smiled. He transferred the omamori that was between his hands into one of his palms and closed his fist around it. He held out his other hand, palm up.

“Okay so, you do the same thing, except opposite, so you can put your fist over my palm. Then on the count of three we can open our palms at the same time and see the omamori! No cheating though, got it?”

Gaara agreed to the rules.

Four seconds later, and he stared at the blue and gold charm in his palm that read ‘Happiness.’

~~

They made their way back to Gaara’s inn with a few hours to spare before the closing ceremony. Along the way, they stopped once with the excuse of looking at some rare bird that (according to Gaara) only inhabited the Land of Valleys.

It was a nice enough bird, but Naruto found it more nice after it had flown away and he had the chance to kiss Gaara. It was over quickly because there were more people traveling through the woods between the shrine and the village at this time, since the ceremony was so close.

Naruto packed up his things in Gaara’s room, feeling reluctant. He didn’t want to be leaving so soon, although he knew it was necessary. He also couldn’t complain about his last night he’d spent with Gaara. That experience alone would keep him going for a long, long time…

Gaara began to change into his ceremonial clothes, and Naruto very pointedly looked away.

“It’s fine,” Gaara said.

Naruto stayed facing the opposite direction until Gaara needed him to tie his obi. They didn’t have a lot of time, and Naruto was not going to be responsible for the Kazekage being late to the closing ceremony!

His fingers fumbled as he tied the heavy fabric, but he managed.

Naruto stepped back and couldn’t help but cast his eyes down the length of Gaara’s body.

_No time. Tsunade-baachan will be on the war path. He always looks nice, this isn’t a big deal!_

Gaara put his hands on Naruto’s hips, drawing him forward.

_Fuck, fuck, fuck—there isn’t enough time—!_

“We won’t have much time after the ceremony,” Gaara murmured.

Naruto nearly choked on his own saliva. He wanted so badly to forget about being on time and to sink into Gaara’s arms, but—but_—_!

“Tsunade-baachan will kill me,” Naruto managed.

Gaara smiled wickedly. “I won’t let her.”

Naruto threw his arms around Gaara’s neck and kissed him.

They could both be selfish today.

~~

The ceremony was delayed because a thunderstorm kicked up. Naruto and Gaara arrived under the cover of pouring rain, and no one was the wiser. The daimyo refused to leave their palanquin until the rain had stopped.

When an hour had passed, and the rain showed no sign of letting up, the Tsuchikage had some of his shinobi construct a domed earth wall around the entire shrine. Other ninja used fire style jutsu to light candles and lanterns. The additional time it took to set everything up gave Naruto just enough time to get an earful from Sakura about how he could have been late and ruined everything.

“But he wasn’t,” Sai had said, which had earned him a punch to the head.

He was still rubbing his temple when the ceremony finally began.

Naruto made sure to lock eyes with Tsunade-baachan when it was her turn to speak. Somehow, he resisted the urge to make a face at her. Well, he might have made a face, but he didn’t stick his tongue out or pull his eyelid down. If she weren’t so professional and good at being Hokage or whatever, she probably would have rolled her eyes at him.

When it was Gaara’s turn, both Sakura and Sai poked him in the ribs teasingly.

_What the hell! Who was really ruining the ceremony here?_

But Naruto wasn’t actually all that bothered about it. He loved Gaara, and he was glad his friends knew, even if they would endlessly mock him about it. A little embarrassment was a small price to pay for what he shared with Gaara.

Gaara spoke eloquently, and though Naruto didn’t really understand the archaic language of the speech, he stood with rapt attention. This same voice had been the one that had whispered in his ear last night in the cave, the same one that had chastised him for being careless and getting hurt, the same one that called out to him with concern, that soothed over his past scars, that ordered him back with trepidation, beckoned him closer with huffy impatience.

There were numerous emotions that Gaara could now voice, and for that Naruto was grateful. He had gone from someone locked away in a self imposed prison in his own mind to someone who was comfortable addressing a crowd of thousands. He had made so much progress, and Naruto knew that he would only continue to grow. Both of them would continue to strive.

This might be one of the last times that he heard Gaara’s voice for a while, and Naruto made a promise to himself that he definitely would hear it again. Days, weeks, months, the time frame didn’t matter (although a shorter period was preferable). They would see each other again, and Gaara could reveal all the new ways he’d become a better person, and hopefully Naruto could share the same. They would be better, for each other, and maybe one day...in a time of peace…

Just as soon as it started, Gaara’s speech ended. The Mizukage stepped up to take her turn, but Naruto kept his eyes fastened on Gaara. He wanted to remember every little detail about him. He wanted to be able to draw upon this memory for inspiration for when things would inevitably get rough in the future. It may have been sentimental, but Naruto could think of no better treasure to keep.

Shortly after, the ceremony was over. The daimyo were the first to leave, and then the civilians. Shinobi were the last to file out, returning the earth to the way it was when they’d arrived. Squads clumped together, heading back to their lodging to gather their things and depart.

Naruto scanned through the crowd, looking for Gaara but not seeing him. He felt Sakura and Sai staring at him expectantly.

“I...uh...I need to get my stuff...it’s in Gaara’s room,” Naruto rattled, though they both already knew that.

Sakura smiled. “Just meet us at the entrance to our inn when you’re done...But don’t take too long. An hour before sundown and we’re leaving, with or without you!”

Sai joined in with his overbearing creepy grin. “Naruto won’t need that much time.”

Naruto’s eye twitched in annoyance, but to his surprise Sakura came to his rescue.

“Shut up! This is the last time they’ll see each other for a while!” She turned to Naruto, “So don’t screw it up!”

Naruto had not been worried about screwing it up before. He was now.

His stomach twisted in a very unpleasant way.

~~

By the time he reached the Kazekage’s inn, he could hear his stomach gurgling. As soon as he and his team were on their way back to the village, he was going to have to make them stop. _Serves them right for making him so nervous!_

He wasn’t even sure why he was suddenly so ill at ease. He couldn’t fuck up a goodbye _that_ badly, and even if he did, Gaara likely wouldn’t care.

The window was wide open, so he dropped in from the adjacent roof. Gaara’s things had all been packed and taken away, but Naruto’s bag remained by the door. Gaara, Kankuro, and Temari were sitting around the little table that had previously held a tea set and a vase of rare flowers.

“Yo, Naruto!” Kankuro called amicably, and all three siblings turned their attention to him.

Naruto’s stomach growled in response. He was embarrassed, but instead of feeling hot, his body began to feel cold. Pain stabbed through his gut, and his vision fuzzed.

A flash of a memory streaked past, and though he didn’t really _see_ it, he already knew.

_Gaara’s body, heavy in his arms…_

He clenched his teeth and ran a hand through his hair, desperate to stay in the moment. His eyes wavered between each of the three faces in front of him, but they were blending together with the memory.

_Sakura’s tears falling to the ground...Chiyo’s heavy sigh…_

“I came to get my things,” Naruto heard himself say, but his voice sounded far away and he wasn’t sure if he’d actually said it or just thought it.

_Chairs scraped across the floor...or was that happening now?_

Mumbling, and then Gaara’s arms were around him.

“It’s okay. It’s over. It’s not happening anymore.” Gaara’s voice rumbled against him. “I’m safe and you’re safe. Come sit down.”

Naruto felt dizzy as his vision blurred between the past and the present. He was sitting now, though he had been sitting then too. In the dry desert sand…

“Look at all the scratches on this table. And here’s a stain from a teacup. Are you looking? Come on, Naruto. Tell me what you see.”

Naruto dragged his eyes to the table. The wooden surface was worn. There were nicks and scratches and stains that indicated it had been in use for a long time. There was a dark ring near the edge, the teacup stain that Gaara had mentioned. Edges of the stain bled out in the direction of the grain of the wood.

Smooth long fingers brushed across the table, catching Naruto’s eyes. He followed their motion across the surface, over each imperfection in the table. In contrast, Gaara’s fingers bore no scars. His skin was as smooth as water.

“Sorry, I--”

“Don’t.” Gaara wrapped around him tighter.

Naruto’s body still felt cold, his stomach was still clenched. He stared hard at the table, analyzing the changes in hue of the wood, the distance between each grain.

His vision started to focus, but the anxiety remained.

“Gaara, I--”

“I’ll be fine,” Gaara murmured, answering a question that Naruto had yet to ask, “It won’t be like last time, ever again. We know better now.”

Naruto clutched at Gaara’s arms which were strung around him, and he pressed them against himself.

“But--”

“It’s over now. It’s okay. And if anything, I’m worried about you. You’re still a jinchuuriki...you’re at a greater risk.”

Naruto wasn’t worried about himself, and Gaara probably knew that. He couldn’t tell Gaara not to worry, just as much as Gaara would not be able to convince him that he would be totally fine.

They could, however, work through this memory together.

He scanned the room again. Kankuro and Temari were gone. The window was still open, letting through a cool breeze. Outside there was a light rain falling, the sound of which Naruto was beginning to recognize again.

Gaara was holding him tight. He leaned into the embrace.

“Damn it. I just wanted to say goodbye, and now I’m going to be late,” Naruto muttered, rubbing at his face.

The coldness in the pit of his stomach was melting, replaced by a burning frustration. This could have been a touching goodbye, but he’d messed it up. He was mad at himself for reliving this memory, and he was mad at himself for back then too. If only he’d gotten there sooner...if only...

Gaara shifted behind him. “I don’t have to leave right away, so I was planning to walk with you and your team to the edge of the village. Is that okay?”

A small amount of tension left him. He seized the spark of frustration inside of him and redirected it through the memory. Gaara was right, they’d turned out okay. Since then, both of them had only become stronger! And if Naruto continued to work hard, then it could never happen again. He wouldn’t let it!

“Yeah,” he replied finally, his voice a bit breathy. He closed his eyes and let his new resolve build up within him. When he spoke again, his voice was strong. “Let’s do it!”

~~

If Kakashi-sensei and Yamato-taichou were surprised to see Gaara, Kankuro, and Temari tagging along with Naruto, they did not react. If anyone wondered why Naruto needed three Sand ninja (including the Kazekage) to escort him out of the village, no one asked.

Naruto was glad for the big group of people. He was always happy to be surrounded by friends, and Kankuro and Temari seemed to lighten the mood. They bantered with Sakura and Sai, and even got a few laughs from Kakashi and Yamato.

Other squads and clusters of people were also still trickling out of the village, so they weren’t the only group talking and laughing. Despite this being a time of parting ways for many ninja, the atmosphere was light.

Gaara and Naruto walked side by side, their shoulders almost touching. If anyone noticed, no one mentioned it. The two were more subdued than their comrades (although it was typical for Gaara to be silent at times like this). Naruto was just letting everything sink in. His friends were having a good time, the festival had been a success, and Gaara was by his side. Everything felt right.

(Although, Naruto was still going to stop his team a little ways out of the village to go to the bathroom. His stomach was still kind of mad at him).

By the time they reached the edge of the village, Naruto was ready to leave.

Everyone paused to say their goodbyes. The Leaf and Sand shinobi left a healthy amount of space around Gaara and Naruto, as if offering them some kind of privacy.

“So, I’m still pretty bad at this...” Naruto admitted, rubbing the back of his head.

Gaara held out his hand, sand already swirling around it. Naruto reached for Gaara’s hand, as if to shake it, and as they clasped hands he heard more sand hissing around them. A perimeter wall of sand formed around them, giving them some actual privacy.

Gaara pulled Naruto forward and kissed him.

Naruto was surprised, but he snapped out of it quick enough to kiss back.

“Stay safe,” he whispered, after they had pulled away.

Gaara’s lips quirked up into a small smile. “That goes for you too. As far as I’m concerned, I owe you one…”

His eyes searched Naruto’s, and then, almost inaudibly, he added, “You won’t ever have to know what it’s like to lose your bijuu.”

One last hug, and the two stepped away from each other. The sand wall surrounding them crumbled, and they both joined the ninja from their respective villages.

Walking away, Naruto found himself subconsciously placing a hand over his seal mark.

A strange idea was taking form in his mind.

He wondered if the nine-tails had a name…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so, we've reached the end of this fic! I also finally finished Shippuden! I know this might sound silly, but it's kind of a big deal for me. I started watching Naruto when I was 13, and now I'm 25, so it really has been a journey (nearly half of my life!). I feel like I've grown up with Naruto in a way. I used to joke that Naruto was the only constant in my life, and now that it's over, I do feel a little empty. But every ending is a new beginning (or so they say). After all, one day, I'm sure I'll start watching Boruto.
> 
> Anyway, thank you to everyone who read along!! I'm glad we could all share our mutual love of what is obviously the best pairing in Naruto <3


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